After a "refashioning" of the 1889 Imperial System in the Constitution of Imperial Japan, Emperor Meiji remained essentially imageless and wordless, in contrast to the blatant display of political power by European monarchs and modern dictators through their images and oratories.
The presentation offers some suggestions to deliberate upon this phenomenon, using both Japanese cultural explanations, such as the belief in the soul, and comparative perspective on the representations of political vis-B-vis religious power.