Confucianism as Neo-Confucianism, together with persecution of Buddhism (Tsunoda, et al. 313). The impulse toward political consolidation within Japan and rejection of Chinese influence seems to have enabled Nobunaga to portray something like tolerance for the presence of Western people and ideas. Tsunoda, et al., explain:
[C]ordiality toward the Christian missionaries newly arrived in Japan seems to have been inspired fundamentally by a desire to learn, but perversely also by his antipathy for traditional Buddhism. In any case his obvious admiration for the high intelligence and nobility of these intrepid Jesuits, as well as his generous treatment of them, won for Nobunaga the distinction of being the first great Japanese leader for whom Western accounts of Japan were to become important biographical sources (Tsunoda, et al. 313).
The early nationalism of the Japanese in their encounters with the West documented by Tsunoda, et al., may be attributed to the ethnocentrism of the Neo-Confucian thought that dominated the Tokugawa reign. This persisted through the so-called Shinto revival, by which time Japan's exceptionalism had been valorized and all external influences suppressed. In that connection, only the Dutch had any trade presence in Japan after 1639, specifically at Nagasaki (Tsunoda, et al. 554). That made Nagasaki and the Dutch language the mediator of Western culture through Japan until the 19th century. However, as of the 18th century, at least among the educated elites, Western culture was being studied seriously. Tsunoda, et al., cite the attitude of the scholar Hirata Atsutane (1776-1843): "Although Hirata was at pains to revile the nations of the West whenever the necessity arose of proving that Japan was uniquely blessed, he also occasionally expressed a grudging admiration for Western science and even for Western theology" (Tsunoda, et al. 541). Two of Atsutane's contemporaries, scholars Honda Toshiaki and Sato No...