of ancient Japan--known as Shinto, or "the way of
the gods"--had not fully emerged from therianthropic polytheism is
proved by the fact that, though the deities were generally
represented in human shape, they were frequently conceived as
spiritual beings, embodying themselves in all kinds of things,
especially in animals, reptiles, or insects. Thus, tradition relates
that the Kami of Mimoro Mountain appeared to the Emperor Yuryaku
(A.D. 457-459) in the form of a snake; that during the reign of the
Emperor Keitai (A.D. 507-531), a local deity in the guise of a
serpent interfered with agricultural operations and could not be
placated until a shrine was built in its honour; that in the time of
the Emperor Kogyoku, the people of the eastern provinces devoted
themselves to the worship of an insect resembling a silkworm, which
they regarded as a manifestation of the Kami of the Moon; that the
Emperor Keiko (A.D. 71-130) declared a huge tree to be sacred; that
in the days of the Empress Suiko (A.D. 593-628), religious rites were
performed before cutting down a tree supposed to be an incarnation of
the thunder Kami; that on the mountain Kannabi, in Izumo, there stood
a rock embodying the spirit of the Kami whose expulsion from Yamato
constituted the objective of Ninigi's expedition, and that prayer to
it was efficacious in terminating drought, that the deity
Koto-shiro-nushi became transformed into a crocodile, and that "the
hero Yamato-dake emerged from his tomb in the shape of a white swan."

Many other cognate instances might be quoted. A belief in amulets and
charms, in revelations by dreams and in the efficacy of ordeal,
belongs to this category of superstitions. The usual form of ordeal
was by thrusting the hand into boiling water. It has been alleged
that the Shinto religion took no account of a soul or made any
scrutiny into a life beyond the grave. Certainly no ideas as to
places of future reward or punishment seem to have engrossed
attention, but there is evidence that not only was the spirit (tama)
recognized as surviving the body, but also that the spirit itself was
believed to consist of a rough element (am) and a gentle element
(nigi), either of which predominated according to the nature of the
functions to be performed; as when a nigi-tama was believed to have
attached itself to the person of the Empress Jingo at the time of her
expedition to Korea, while an ara-tama formed the vanguard of her
forces.

Some Ja