The ï¾µsthetic principles governing the art are hardly separable from the ethics which inspire them. The sage, the poet, and the philosopher, have been in Japan the chief patrons and practitioners of the accomplished arts. The art of painting, the tea cult, the floral art, and also the art of landscape gardening, are alike enveloped in an atmoshere of quaint philosophy. It is customary to invest with the mystery and sanctity of philosophical import, rules and theories of design which might be easily explained by mere considerations of artistic taste. An appeal to superstitious reverence seems to have been thought necessary in order to preserve the arts in their purity, and prevent them from degenerating into license. Thus, that which offended the taste of the cultured was forbidden to the vulgar, as being inauspicious. Combinations in design, destructive of ï¾µsthetic harmony, were placed under the ban of ill-luck; and others productive of artistic repose were classed as specially propitious.
