To think about thought requires attention to, at least, three factors.

First, we must make clear the positive manner of thinking. Because thought is the effect of thinking, we must discuss the dynamic structure of thinking.

Second, we must make clear what is produced through this dynamic structure, namely, the thought produced by thinking.

Third, we must not forget to observe the results produced by thought, e.g., social institutions and the emergence of culture. If there is an interaction between thought and cultural appearance this interactive phenomenon must be included.

Thought is formed through thinking activity which, in turn, follows a line of logic. Logic, however, is embedded in language, which is ruled by grammar. Therefore we must regard the characteristic points of Japanese grammatical structure in order to discuss the characteristics of Japanese thought. The following reflection does not require any linguistic knowledge of the Japanese language, although it refers to the grammatical structure. To make this accessible to the reader, a comparative method with Western language will be employed.

Being is said in many senses wrote Aristotle in his Metaphysics. This is summarized by Thomas Aquinas in the following form: "being is said in two senses (Ens dicitur dupliciter)". This means the grammatical isoform with semantic difference. For example:

Here is a box.

(a)

In the box there is an animal.

(b)

This animal is a cat.

(c)

From these three sentences we can immediately understand the meaning of the word grammatical isoform of semantic difference in regard to the word "is". The "is (a)" means the existence of an inorganic thing (box). The "is (b)" means the existence of an organic, living object (animal). The "is (c)" does not mean the existence of anything, but functions as a copula which combines subject and predicate in a sentence. So we can say without hesitation that there are at least two different senses under the same form, namely, designation of existence and copulative function of same being. "Is (a)" and "is (b)" designate existence, and "is (c)" designates copula. These three sentences are said in Japanese in the following form:

Koko-ni hako-ga arimasu (Here is a box.)

(here) (box) (is)

(a)

Hako-no-naka-ni dobutsu-ga imasu (In the box there is an animal.)

(in the box) (animal) (is)

(b)

Kono dobutsu-wa neko desu (This animal is a cat.)

(this animal) (cat) (is)

(c)

It is not necessary to think about the details. The important thing is the fact that in the Japanese language there are three different grammatical forms for the three different semantic phenomena. Namely, the verb for the existence of a lifeless inorganic object like a box is said arimasu, the existence of living thing like an animal is said imasu, and finally the copula is said in the form of desu.

Here we must state at least two very important things about Japanese thinking.

(1) There is no possibility of analogia "entis" like in Western language.

(2) In the sign of existence there is a clear formal difference between the lifeless thing and a living existence.

As I mentioned above, it is very difficult to discover the grammatical possibility for analogia entis in the Japanese language. Instead of this fact, or in other words in contrast to this fact, there is analogia nullius rei, analogy of nothingness in the Japanese language.

Here is no box (koko-ni hako-ga arimasen).

In the box there is no animal (hako-no-naka-ni dobutsu-ga imasen).

This animal is not a cat (kono dobutsu-wa neko dewa arimasen).

For the negative form of existence in the English sentence "no" is used, and for the negative form of copula not is used. "No" and "not" come, naturally, from the same etymological origin, but at least they do not have completely the same form. By contrast, in the Japanese language, the three negative forms "masen" are the same. If we use the formal sentence (not the oral form used in everyday conversation), the negative form for three different situations are expressed as "nai", or in the older form "arazu"; they are the same.

We can easily say that there is a possibility of an analogy of nothingness, because the philosophical origin of negation is negation itself, negation as such, nothingness. And, as is well known, not only in Japanese thinking but also in Chinese or all over the Asian world, the nothingness which is thought beyond being is the key word for philosophy. I will not now enter into this problem, but I would like to make clear the existence of an antipodic contrast between the occidental and the oriental world to which Japan belongs, through denoting the contrast of analogy of nothingness and the analogy of being. Note also the linguistic difference between organic existence and inorganic existence in the Japanese language, which opens a very interesting reflection on the technological problem below.

As mentioned above, I wish to attempt a comparative study in order to make clear the character of the Japanese thinking. A danger of comparative study is sometimes to exaggerate some outstanding phenomena. I avoid using superficial comparisons and impressistic observations, and will go to what is fundamental or basic. Here, we wish to discuss the concept of truth through the philosophical reflection of the linguistic fact. As the Greek tradition is one of the most important origins of Western culture with regard to philosophy, I will take an example from the Greek philosophy.

The word "truth" in Greek is aletheia, which means either "what comes out from forgetfulness" or "what is from forgetfulness". Therefore we can safely say that this word means "clear from being present in the consciousness". We can come to see this form (idea) through the logos, because Socrates says that logos is the most important organ of the philosopher. Logos has many important senses which are connected to each other in a logical structure, namely, word-concept-syllogism-rule-calculation and theory. These senses make one system of thinking in the identity of the word logos, namely, in order to make clear the truth we must express the object in the word, and through the logical calculation in the form of syllogism we must find out the rule of the phenomenon and finally we must formulate what we think in the proposition as theory.

Therefore the truth is stated in the objective form of concept: truth is logical form. Naturally there are some exceptional opinions in the occidental world on another form of truth, but principally what I have depicted is the authentic type of truth. In the Japanese language what words are connected with logos and aletheia? There is an interesting word connection of the group of koto (situation). In the Japanese language the truth is makoto. Ma signifies perfect or beautiful and koto denotes the situation. Kotoba denotes the theory, but etymologically it means analysis of a situation.

What is the truth according to the Japanese makoto which signifies the perfect siltation? If we are in the process of arithmetical calculation, the perfect situation as makoto must be accomplished after finishing the theoretical calculation. But the perfect situation is not always accomplished through theoretical activity. The situation in which the child faces the danger of death is a given imperfect situation, remote from the truth as perfect situation. We must realize the truth as a perfect situation in the middle of the injured given situation. To jump into the river and to make efforts to save the child is the way to truth as perfect situation.

This comparison is naturally too simple; nevertheless, I dare say it is not meaningless. In the Western tradition there are many long, discursive books which make efforts to demonstrate the objective truth through logical arguments. By contrast, in the Eastern tradition there are many symbolic abbreviations in which the writer as a philosopher realized the perfect situation. That is the reason behind the Zen-Buddhistic meditation, in which the argument in discussion is strictly forbidden, and in which the suggestive expression after a long silence is welcomed.

Perhaps we may say without serious danger that the typical form of the Western philosophical truth is objective science as knowledge and the typical form of the Eastern philosophical truth is subjective wisdom as salvation. So, there is an inclination to natural science in Western philosophy and an inclination towards religion in Eastern philosophy.

In this word series of koto (situation) we must say the word (a little part of situation, kotoba) cannot grasp a given situation (koto), not to mention the perfect situation (makoto) as truth.

Every nation has its own mythology. This is the natural origin of the nation’s characteristic thought because it is the reflection of the destiny and unified imagination of pre-historical legend, sustained by the primitive world view of the nation.

Japanese mythology has a remote origin which had been conveyed through oral recitation. The oldest known written record was edited at the beginning of the 8th century in a book called Kojiki (the record of the old things) which contains many old oral traditions. In this book we can discover the botanic view of the world or vegetal assimilation of all the processes of the world.

All myths have an imaginative exposition of the origin of the cosmos. In the Japanese myth according to Kojiki there is no god as creator. In the beginning of the cosmos (heaven and earth) there arose at first the god of the center (the apotheosis of seed) and then secondly two gods of binding (apotheosis of ripening of the fruit).

In the beginning of the world there was a watery chaos, the unstable vagueness of a jellyfish, from which came out something like a sprout of reed. And this sprout has the name of a beautiful male god of the reed sprout.

This god is the incarnation of the three unseen powers as symbol of seed and ripening. And this god, the reed sprout, is the origin of all the natural phenomena. Therefore we can confirm that the unconscious ground of the Japanese traditional thought has been formulated with the botanic language. It means that the Japanese world view has the tendency towards the reduction of human history to the vegetable dimension.

Throughout Japanese spiritual history the influence of this vegetable assimilation and humanity has been so strong that many ethical and aesthetic terms used in modern times were originally adjectives for the vegetable phenomenon and that whole family emblems have always been designed using the leaves of trees.

The vegetable existence does not usually move from one place to another. Its dynamic movement is normally divided into two kinds, the first growing up and down because during growth they develop trunk, branches, leaves and roots; the second is the horizontal movement of leaves of branches through the wind. Sometimes the leaves are prophets of the seasonal wind through their trembling, sometimes the branches are the organ of the wind for its roaring, sometimes the groves are the defence against the wind for the village. In such a way the wind is a phenomenon correlative to vegetable. So the moral philosophy or aesthetic of the vegetable viewpoint of the world calls for the philosophy of the wind as its essential counterpart. Actually, the wind as natural phenomenon itself is very interesting: it is essentially invisible, but it functions very effectively, namely, when it blows strongly like a storm it destroys human dwellings and sinks ships; and when it blows gently, it gives consolation to the tired eye or the sad and sorrowful ear. So the wind can be used as a symbol of the transcendental principle.

At the end of the Japanese mediaeval time the wind was used as the most important key word for poetics, because in the poem or art in general, the unseen and untouchable atmosphere must be created through the visible form and audible voice, and because the wind is the most suitable word for this unseen, untouchable and influencing atmosphere.

In the course of the years the spiritual importance of the symbol of the wind has been used more and more intensively, so that the wind became the terminology in the domain of moral philosophy and Buddhistic religion.

In my opinion, in the natural world the form of the things shows their essence and function so clearly that the form in general can become one of the most important key words for describing the world. So, the "idea" of Plato as principle denotes the form, as is well-known. But technology has changed such a natural world so extremely that there are now many isomorphic and heterofunctional machines in which the decisive priority of form with regard to function must be rejected. Therefore we must seek out some other principle for new dimensions in this technological world, for which purpose, the wind as principle of the world could be helpful. At this moment I hope at least the suggestive force of Japanese classical philosophy for the revival of thought is possible or can be recommended.

I would like to show some examples of the vegetable influence on the aesthetic terminology in our tradition.

The oldest word for "beautiful" is "kuashi", which means dense and compact natural growth of the leaves. That can be demonstrated through the philosophical facts, but I refrain from going into linguistic detail in this text.

In medieval poetics there are many symbolic terms for the aesthetic fulfillment of poetic creation, e.g., "hana" (flower) as rhetorical beauty of the word, "tane" (seed) as creative moment of poetic activity, "taketakashi" (tall tree) as sublime, etc.

This tendency to reduce the artistic or poetic activity to the vegetable is continuously inherited in the later periods of our history. At the end of the mediaeval time in the dramatic theory of the "no" play an outstanding aesthetician, Seami, used also the word hana (flower) as the most sublime and deepest value of dramatic expression. Moreover, as he taught the principal attitude of actors in drama, he wrote that in the drama of mystic divinity, people should be like a gigantic cypress, in the drama of grace like a blooming cherry tree, in the drama of tragic love like a marble tree in autumn with red burning leaves.

And in modern times, Basho, poet of the "haiku" (short poem consisting of 17 syllables) and at the same time an able aesthetician, said, as he taught his disciples how to create a poem, "learn the spirit of a pine tree from the pine tree itself". For him the tree is the teacher. Not only in the domain of aesthetics but also, and more importantly, in the domain of ethics, there is a strong tendency to reduce human morality to the vegetable.

The pine tree is a symbol of steadiness and unchangeable loyalty, the bamboo a symbol of straightforwardness and strong will, the plum flower is a symbol of dignity and a forerunner, and the cherry blossom stands for sacrificing death at the peak of one’s life.

Similar symbolism of vegetable phenomena can be found all over the world, but it has been far more used in Japan than in any other place.

In the Kojiki there are dramatic developments of the world of gods. These mythological stories are very interesting due to the interaction of many gods, who are mostly the personification of natural phenomena. So, not only because of the polytheistic structure, but also because of the visual description of dramatic construction, there is a resemblance between Japanese myth in Kojiki and Greek myth in Hesiod and Homer, etc., as was observed by the French orientalist, René Grousset. Although Kojiki resembles Greek myth in this, there ar two remarkable differences between both traditional myths.

The first is that, in the Japanese myth there is no war on the sea, but by contrast the Homeric epics contain a history of war and wandering on the sea. The lack of consciousness of this war on the sea in Japanese myth suggests that the Japanese, even in prehistoric time, had no perspective of foreign cultures and no consciousness of the existence of other countries. The Japanese myth is accomplished within the limited little islands united in Japan proper. There was a world theory, but it was constructed only vertically within the autistic narrowness of Japan itself, namely, there are first the land of the heaven (Takama-nohara, that is to say grassland of high heaven); and second the middle country of reed land (Ashihara-no-nakatsukuni), namely, Japan itself. This country, Japan, consists of several islands, which were children produced by the gods. So, the gods, islands as nature and human beings were children produced by the gods. So, the gods, islands as nature, and human beings were constructed as a relationship of family; namely, the gods are like father and mother, the nature, and human beings are brothers and sisters, or at least relatives.

There is the movement of cosmic eros through the universe. Therefore nature is not objectified enough to be observed or to be used or abused as tool of the egoism of humanity, at least in the traditional thought of Japan. That is one positive side of Japanese myth, but at the same time there is no possibility of a strong consciousness of human dignity, entirely different from cosmic animality. The individuality of the person, as the essence of human being, was not evident in the mind of the people at that time. It was hidden under the anthropomorphic description of the natural world as the dimension of human relatives. And third, under this world of the middle land there was thought to be the land of Hade (Yonu-no-kum) wherein the dead people were hidden.

Although Japanese myth, as I have stated above, is full of dramatic scenes, which are visually described, only four colors are named in the old text of Kojiki; namely, white, red, black and blue. It is really curious that we find only these four colors in the Kojiki and that in Manyoshu (10,000 leaves -- the oldest anthology of traditional poems), edited almost at the same time, we find about 20 different color names. What is the reason for this remarkable differences in both texts in this point?

We can guess without danger that the Kojiki maintained the older and primitive oral traditional, which is more original and older than the many poems created by poets who can be identified individually. So, it is my opinion that these four colors in Kojiki, namely, white, red, black and blue, belong to the original, primitive arrangement of Japanese color consciousness.

We may not say, however, that these four colors are fundamental only in Japan. Within the Chinese sphere of influence there are four protecting guardian animals which are posed at the four gates (East, West, North, South) of the capital city. These animals have their own color: white tiger, red pheasant, black turtle, blue dragon. These guard animals must protect the yellow emperor (in Chinese tradition gold is symbolized by the yellow color and also the Chinese natural world is the perspective of yellow immensity. Therefore in China the color yellow is the supreme color under which the other four colors are dominated.

But in the Kojiki there is no name for yellow color. And at least in Kojiki there is no influence of such four animals guarding the gates of the capital. The four colors are mentioned already in the process of the wandering history of gods, long before the establishment of a capital city in Japan. Therefore we can confirm that these four colors are really the original color arrangement of the Japanese. According to my research (details of which cannot be presented here; see my Aesthetic in the Orient), the four colors mentioned above have among them the most interesting anthropological symbolic relations.

- White is used only for the glory of god, the cleanness of the heart and the vividness of life. Therefore it is the symbol of luck.

- Red is used only for blood, which means the danger of life or the testimony of life; therefore sometimes it is the symbol of unluckiness.

-Black is used for badness, dirtiness and also for death and for the world of Hades, where there is no light. Therefore it is the symbol of misfortune.

These three colors construct the human subjective destiny. By contrast, blue is used for leaves of the trees or grass, for sky, mountains and water. Therefore it is the symbol of the natural environment wherein the human existence, consisting of three colors, is situated (Blue denotes the environment, fells us also that the vegetable things are the most important elements of which Japanese land, where the vegetal world view has been collectively created.)

In Kojiki the color is anthropologically or even philosophically so important that, after the acceptance of Buddhism, the Chinese character of color has been used in Japan in place of the word form in the European tradition. In European philosophy the form (Platonic idea, Aristotelian eidos) is the essence of the thing, whereas in Japanese tradition, the color represents the existence of the thing.

Until now we have studied the two moments of thought: the first, its subjective activity, thinking, namely, logical structure; and the second, the characteristic points of the original objective thought in Kojiki, what was thought through the above logic.

The third part of this article is a reflection on the produced thing by which I understand the material crystallization and phenomenal emergence of the thought supported by thinking.

By the word’s "material crystallization" I understand here only the work of art, by "phenomenal emergence" I understand here only religious liturgy and moral deed.

Very clearly everyone can remark that there is an antipodal difference between the traditional occidental painting and the traditional oriental painting. The former is the representation of the objective world with regard to form and color. In this type of paintings there is no unpainted nothingness, it is always finished, finito. We can find here the influence of the objective, descriptive method of thinking and the observational spirit of scientific thought: that is the result of the idea of mimesis which is highly valued by Plato and Aristotle as a fundamental idea for artistic creation. In the latter, namely, in oriental painting, there is a concentrated expression of the one phase of one thing behind which there is the waste white space of nothingness.

There is no perfect form and there is no real imitation of colors: i.e., the paintings are sometimes monochronic, that is to say, there is no objective description with regard to the form and color of the phenomenal world. Almost all Western scholars call such paintings non-finito, because externally there is no fulfillment of objective description of the external world. But according to the oriental idea of art, it is really accomplished, finitissimo, because the painter expresses the most essential in his perspective by ignoring the unnecessary: that is the result of the idea of expression (in Chinese shai). It is unnecessary to mention that the Japanese art belongs to oriental art. So it is very difficult to distinguish how far there is a great difference between Chinese and Japanese architecture in the classical tradition.

In Chinese architecture, e.g., on the Chinese temple, there are many artificial curves in the design of the roof, plenty of ornaments and a lot of colors, but the Japanese temple is very simple and ascetic, without curves, without ornaments, and without color. Also there is a dissimilarity in the Chinese and Japanese paintings. There is a basic difference with regard to the intention behind artistic creation. In Chinese painting the painter expresses his feeling or the spirit of the world intuited internally. By contrast, in the Japanese painting the painter chooses only the most impressive theme and suppresses other things, although they are sometimes necessary.

So Chinese painting is the result of the expression of eloquence, whereas Japanese art is the result of suppression through silence. We must remember that in Japanese art is the result of suppression through silence. We must remember that in the Japanese language the world is kotoba, which means the small part of koto (thing), so that the world cannot reach the splendid fertility of reality.

We must meditate about it in deep silence. Art is the entrance to this silent secret of the universe.

As is well known, in Japan there are now four major religions, namely, Buddhism, Confucianism, Christianity (both Catholics and Protestants and a few other groups, like the Russian Orthodox) and Shintoism. Among them the first three religions come from foreign countries. Confucianism, although it is the first religion accepted in Japan, is usually not enumerated as a religion, but is a humanistic cultural system which penetrates the fundamental consciousness of the Japanese. Christianity is, generally speaking, the religion for the intellectual persons in the cities, which were opened to Western culture after the Meiji restoration, the so-called Japanese modernization. (Naturally, we may not forget the old Christian tradition which has survived through martyrdom in the face of long persecution by the government. But the families who belong to this tradition are very few.)

Therefore the religions in Japan that are actually widespread through the population are only Buddhism and Shintoism. As a result of its doctrine Buddhism has been accepted in Japanese thought without changing its principal character. But in regard to liturgy it has been, to some extent, Japanized. The liturgical change in religion is usually achieved through an attempt at accommodation stimulated by other religions, especially by the native religion. Therefore it is sufficient to discuss the character of the liturgy of Shintoism, which is the only native religion in Japan.

Shintoism derives from the Japanese word Shint , which means the way of god, but it is polytheistic. So there are many gods and goddesses, so that in the oldest text, Kojiki, 8 million gods were supposed to exist. What sorts of gods are they? Principally they are natural gods: sometimes every natural phenomenon is regarded as a god and sometimes the hidden spirit behind the natural phenomenon was regarded as a god.

We have affirmed in the previous section that the proper Japanese religion, Shintoism, is a polytheistic natural religion. Like many other natural religions the principal god is the god of the sun, the sun-goddess in Japan. Being in heaven, she dominates over the whole world. But curiously there is a shrine to this goddess on earth, in Ise. What, then, is the function of this shrine? We may pose such a question because the goddess is in heaven and not in this shrine and, moreover, there is no clear doctrine of ubiquitas Dei in Shintoism. Therefore the shrine must be empty since the sun-goddess is in heaven.

In order to solve this problem, the symbolism of the mirror is effectively used. The mirror which shines by reflecting the sun is on the one hand the symbol of the sun herself and on the other hand it is the symbol of the judgement of god because it shows the face of the person who stands in front of it, the symbol of god. (Perhaps because of this second reason almost all the shrines, not only the ones devoted to the sun-goddess, but also the ones devoted to other gods, have mirrors as a substitute for god.) Therefore the function of the shrine is the place for liturgical movement in front of the symbol of god. The shrine must in principle be constructed only of unpainted wood. The roof is made of straw. In the construction no nails are used for fixing the wood.

What is the meaning of this architecture? It is clear that this architecture is a concrete form of the vegetable point of view of the world and that this simple naturalness of the shrine takes away the luxurious secularity from the mind of the visitors. So the final end of the liturgy is the pure, silent encounter with god in a remote place, away from the common world. But in order to reach this place there are presupposed steps to the liturgy. One must enter through the gate, called torli (seat of the birds as messenger of god). This signifies that the visitor exists after this moment, not in the material world, but in the garden of the spiritual. In order to show it visually, small white sand stones cover the ground, and acoustically the trees bring the voice of the wind as a sign of the vividness of nature. Through this atmosphere the visitor already acquires an elevated mood. The visitor must wash his hands and clean his mouth with fountain water in the little hall. This is the symbol of purification of the body, but it is the reminiscence of the old style of purification when visitors had to enter a river to clean themselves.

In order to purify the mind from sin and crime, after the purification by water, the visitor comes to the front of the shrine and claps his hands twice in order to draw divine attention to himself. He bows and then the priest comes with a symbol of trees, made of white paper and wood, and swings it above the bowing head of the visitor in order to drive away sin and crime.

The origin of this liturgy of purification was perhaps the oldest ascetic deed in the river and in the mountains because, as I have mentioned, in Japanese natural religion the natural entities and phenomena like river, mountain and winds are gods as such. Therefore the liturgical form mentioned above is the practically compacted style of purification without ascetic essence, but it retains the psychological protection of the divinity. The central thought of this liturgy is clearly written in the text of the "Norito" (prayer) of "Otsugomou" (the last day of the month) in "Engishiki" (one of ;the ligurtical canons edited in the 9th century): the principle thought behind this canon is that when the sins and crimes of every sort become replete in the country of Japan, then the priests of all the shrines have to read this canon in order to evoke the divine winds which sweep out all the sins and crimes like dirt into the water of the sea where a certain ocean god swallows them and brings them to the bottom of the ocean in order to spit them out of the mouth into the split of this bottom, so that all the world gets purified.

This optimistic idea of purification is like a legal institution, automatically operated without subjective regard, moral reflection, or religious sense of guilt. We can confirm that here the excessive longing for cleanliness is so strong that it is not permitted to reserve any space for subjective remorse which contain the shadow of dirty sin. So here we have a religion without inner repentance. The sins and crimes must be completely forgotten in order to live brightly in the difficult world. Although this superficial optimism for the clear dimension without repentance has been to some extent remedied and deepened by the spiritual influence of Buddhism, received in the 7th century but especially accepted after the 12th century (by received I understand taken in hand objectively, and by accept I understand taken into the heart), in my opinion, even today we can perceive its influence in the excessive use of game centers and TV in the daily life of Japan, because such technological apparatus makes people forget every thought of internal conflict brought by personal imperfection and makes them recover their vitality in the real world.

So technology takes the place of religion in regard to the so-called "purification". The religious festival is also transformed into popular performance wherein the substitution of religious ecstasy is experienced in order to forget the spiritual stress.

In the realm of philosophy of religion Japan we can also discover such an influence of so-called purification in two delicate ways. First, in Shinran Buddhism there is an avoidance of relying on the institution and an accentuation of reliance on the Buddha only through prayer. Even good people receive salvation, not to mention the bad ones. This means that the good persons can enter paradise through their own good deeds without the grace of Buddha, which is very strong. The bad person, to whom Buddha gives his grace through sympathy, must be more definitely saved than the good person without grace.

The second is the opposite of this thought, namely, the independent attitude of Zen-Buddhism which teaches salvation through ascetic meditation which enables us to be unified with the truth. One half of this doctrine is a complete reaction against the superficial attitude without asceticism, but the other half is the inheritance of the forgetfulness of the phenomenal dimension found in the old Shintoism.

The simple optimistic purification of Shintoism without any guilty sense has been amended or moderated through the influence of Confucianism, which the Japanese spiritual world accepted from China in the 4th century. The moral philosophy of Confucius teaches five principal virtues which are charity (love), responsibility, sublimity of deed, of which the summit is liturgy, cognition, and confidence. The very important fact is the inventive consciousness of the second virtue, responsibility. As I have already shown both philologically and philosophically in my many other articles, that virtue, responsibility, is of the relatively recent origin in occidental history. One cannot discover any equivalent Greek word for it and there is no word responsibilitas in the classical or medieval Latin language. The word "responsibility" which we find in John Steward Mill is almost punishability and the German word Verantwortung or Verantwortlichkeit, which was created in the nineteenth century, meant only Zurechnung. The real sense of responsibility as moral response of intersubjectivity has been realized in Western society in the twentieth century. But in the oriental world, especially in China, the moral inter-subjectivity was realized already in classical time through the philosophical reflexion of Confucius, because in his opinion the fundamental fact of human existence is intersubjectivity or interindividuality. At any rate, in Confucius the vertical responsibility to Heaven and the horizontal responsibility to fellowship were strongly known.

The individuum who failed to be responsible in both senses exists outside of intersubjectivity as the fundamental human condition. That is to say, the individuum in question no longer lives as a human being. Here, it is an animal that breathes, because in the oriental world there had been no idea of "persona" until Wang Yangming, who proposed the concept "Ryang Tsi" as Gewissen in later times. The human being who failed to be responsible lost face as a human being; he lives no more as a human, but as an animal. Where is the meaning of his life as a human being? This reflexion guides the Japanese to the ethical idea of suicide. Especially in chivalric morality suicide known as "Harakiri" is a moral idea for the chivalric person who lost face. But suicide as a moral deed of responsibility has been found very often, even in the class of normal merchantman, namely, in the citizenship. The work distributed to the individuum seems to him sometimes to be the task to which he must consecrate his life in order to be responsible enough. This idea is, on the one hand, very good for the effective functioning of the collective project, but, on the other hand, very inhuman because human life seems to be thought of as a functional part of a machine. It is the defect of a tradition without the concept of "persona". But even here we can discover the tragic beauty of the humanity which is consecrated to the virtue responsibility.

Bibliographical note: For Section 1: Reflections on thinking, see my book Betrachtungen über das Eine (1986). For Section 2: Thought, see my books Toyo no Bigaku (Aesthetics in the East) (1980) and Studia comparata de aesthetica (1976). For Section 3: Reflection on the thing produced, see my book Tzai no Tetsugaka (Philosophy in the East and in the West) (1981) and my article "Contrarieté et compatibilité" in Actes du Congres de Santa Margherita, pp. 55-71, Genova, 1990.