The Glocal Book:"The Book of Tea" by Okakura Kakuzou(Tenshin)-No.94

What Atrocities Do We Not Perpetrate

in the Name of Culture and Refinement!

「Sad as it is, we cannot conceal the fact that in spite of our companionship with flowers we have not risen very far above the brute.

Scratch the sheepskin and the wolf within us will soon show his teeth.

It has been said that man at ten is an animal, at twenty a lunatic, at thity a failure, at fort a fraud, and at fifty a criminal.

Perhaps he becames a criminal because he has never creased to be an animal.

Nothing is real to us but hundger, nothing sacred except our own desires.

Shrine after shrine has crumbled before our eyes; but one altar foreever is preserved, that whereon we burn incense to the supreme idol, ーourselves.

Our god is great, and money is his Prophet!

We devastate nature in order to make sacrifice to him.

We boast that we have conquered Matter and forget that it is Matter that has enslaved us.

What atrocities do we not perpetrate in the name of culture and refinement!」
(From the Book of Tea - Flowers, p.91, Charles E.TUttぇCo., Rutland, Vermont, Tokyo, Japan)


What a poor human being at present!

However, yet, we should never give for the wonder of culture and refinement!

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Picture: Acrobat Monkey and His Master by Katashi Oyama
Image Designer: Izumi Mori

The Glocal Book:"The Book of Tea" by Okakura Kakuzou(Tenshin)-No.93

In Joy or Sadness,

Flowers are Our Constant Friends

「In joy or sadness, flowers are our constant friends.

We eat, drink, sing, dance, and flirt with them.

We wed and christen with flowers.

We dare not die without them.

We have worshipped with the lily, we have meditated with the lotus, we have charged in battle array with the rose and the chrysanthemum.

We have even attempted to speak in the langurage of flowers.

How could we live without them?

It frightens one to conceive of a world bereft of their presence.

What solace do they not bring to the bedside of the sick, what a light of bliss to the darkness of weary spirits?

Their serene tenderness restores to us our warning confidence in the universe even as the intent gaze of a beautiful child recalls our lost hopes.

When we are laid low in the dust it is they it is they who linger in sorrow over our graves. 」
(From the Book of Tea; Flowers, p.90-91, Charles E. Tuttle Co., Rutland, Vermont, Tokyo, Japan)

Flowers are everywhere in our daily life, not only for personal affairs but also for the socials.

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Picture: Russianblue by Katashi Oyama
Image Designer: Izumi Mori

The Glocal Book:"The Book of Tea" by Okakura Kakuzou(Tenshin)-No.92

The Realm of Art;

The Subtle Use of The Useless

「In the trembling grey of a spring dawn, when the birds were whispering in mysterious cardence among the trees, have you not felt that they were talking to their mates about the flowers?

Surely with the mankind the appreciation of flowers must have been coeval with the poetry of love.

Where better than in a flower, sweet in its unconsciousness, fragrant because of its silence, can we image the unfolding of a virgin soul?

The primeval man in offering the first garland to his maiden therby transcended the brute.

He became human in thus rising above the crude necessities of nature.

He entered the realm of art when he perceived the subtle use of the useless.」
(From the Book of Tea-Flowers, pp.89-90, Charles E. Tuttle Co., Rutland, Vermont, Tokyo, Japan)

Now, let's learn about the role of flowers in the Way of Tea.

Okakura Tenshin talks the interesting story about Japanese Flower arrangements.

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Picture: Amakusa by Katashi Oyama
Image Designer: Izumi Mori

The Glocal Book:"The Book of Tea" by Okakura Kakuzou(Tenshin)-No.91

We Are Destroying Art

in Destroying the Beautiful in Life

「The claims of contemporary art cannot be ignored in any vital scheme of life.

The art of today is that which really belongs to us: it is our own reflection.

In condemning it we but our condemn ourselves.

We say that the present age possesses no art:ーwho is responsible for this?

It is indeed a shame that despite all our rhapsodies about the ancients we pay so

little attention to our own possibilities.

Struggling artists, weary souls lingering in the shadow of cold disdain!

In our self-centred century, what inspiration do we offer them?

The past may well look with pity at the poverty of our civilisation; the future

will laugh at the barrenness of our art.

We are destroying art in destroying the beautiful in life.

Would that some great wizard might from the stem of society shape a mighty harp

whose strings would respond to the touch of genius.」(From the Book of Tea, Art Appreciation, Charles E. Tuttle Co., Rutland, Vermont, TOkyo, Japan, p.87)

The part of Art Appreciation is very difficult to me.

In addition, the Art Appreciation in relation to the Cup of Humanity is much more difficult.

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Picture: Ｍt.Fuji by Katashi Oyama
Image Designer: Izumi Mori

The Glocal Book:"The Book of Tea" by Okakura Kakuzou(Tenshin)-No.90

A Single Masterpiece Can Teach Us

More Than Any Number of Mediocre Products

「The nineteenth century, pregnant with the theory of evolution, has moreover created in us the habit of losing sight of the individual in the species.

A collector is anxious to acquire specimens to illustrate a period or a school and forgets that a single masterpiece can teach us more than any number of the mediocre products of a given period or school.

We classify too much and enjoy too little.

The sacrifice of the aesthetic to the so-called scientific method of exhibition has been the bane of many museums. 」(From the Book of Tea, pp.86-87, Charles E. tuttle Co., Rutland, Vermont, Tokyo, Japan)

I think the facts are very important to understand the aesthetic masterpiece .

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Picture: Kayokukan by Katashi Oyama
Image Designer: Izumi Mori