LIFE AND LETTERS OF JOSEPH HARDY NEESIMA

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SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY. 237 and have passed away forever from our loved J a­pan .... ''Six years after the Restoration (eight years ago) the government took the first step of silent toleration of Christianity by removing from the high places the laws against heresy. Since then this new religion, hand in hand with western learning and civilization, has been gradually spreading not only in the open ports, but even in the interior. Churches are being built with the cross of Christ erected over them, and our people are everywhere being publicly taught the Bible. Already among the believers there are count­less numbers who, having learned the outlines of this religion, go everywhere preaching and admonishing, converting the people, and daily spreading wider and wider the truth. "VVe remember that some six or seven years ago, when Mr. Nakamura of Tokyo published a translation of Dr. Martin's "Evidences of Christianity," there was an anxious discussion in one department o£ our government as to whether such an act could be passed over in silenee. But now everywhere there are stores where Christian books are on sale. w· e are apt merely to notice that Christianity spreads only an inch to-day, and an inch to-morrow; and so accommodat­ing ourselves to its gradual advanee, we do not won­der at its rapid march. But when we sketch on paper the steps of progress, we cannot shut our eyes to the marvelous manner in which it is taking root. And among all these progressive steps, that which seems to us the most astonishing is what is written in the opening sentence of this article: The preaching of the Jesus Way in every centre of Kyoto, the Holy seat o£ Buddhism and Shintoism, the place where the

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