ienseance_[12] comes thus to contain!

[Footnote 12: Etymologically _well-seatedness_.]

If the premise is true that gracefulness means economy of force, then it
follows as a logical sequence that a constant practice of graceful
deportment must bring with it a reserve and storage of force. Fine
manners, therefore, mean power in repose. When the barbarian Gauls,
during the sack of Rome, burst into the assembled Senate and dared pull
the beards of the venerable Fathers, we think the old gentlemen were to
blame, inasmuch as they lacked dignity and strength of manners. Is lofty
spiritual attainment really possible through etiquette? Why not?--All
roads lead to Rome!

As an example of how the simplest thing can be made into an art and then
become spiritual culture, I may take _Cha-no-yu_, the tea ceremony.
Tea-sipping as a fine art! Why should it not be? In the children drawing
pictures on the sand, or in the savage carving on a rock, was the
promise of a Raphael or a Michael Angelo. How much more is the drinking
of a beverage, which began with the transcendental contemplation of a
Hindoo anchorite, entitled to develop into a handmaid of Religion and
Morality? That calmness of mind, that serenity of temper, that composure
and quietness of demeanor, which are the first essentials of _Cha-no-yu_
are without doubt the first conditions of right thinking and right
feeling. The scrupulous cleanliness of the little room, shut off from
sight and sound of the madding crowd, is in itself conducive to direct
one's thoughts from the world. The bare interior does not engross one's
attention like the innumerable pictures and bric-a-brac of a Western
parlor; the presence of _kakemono_[13] calls our attention more to grace
of design than to beauty of color. The utmost refinement of taste is the
object aimed at; whereas anything like display is banished with
religious horror. The very fact that it was invented by a contemplative
recluse, in a time when wars and the rumors of wars were incessant, is
well calculated to show that this institution was more than a pastime.
Before entering the quiet precincts of the tea-room, the company
assembling to partake of the ceremony laid aside, together with their
swords, the ferocity of the battle-field or the cares of government,
there to find peace and friendship.

[Footnote 13: Hanging scrolls, which may be either paintings or
ideograms, used for decorative purposes.]

_Cha-no-yu_ is more than a