This fact, that the opposite of sin is by no means virtue, has been overlooked. The latter is partly a pagan view, which is content with a merely human standard, and which for that very reason does not know what sin is, that all sin is before God. No, the opposite of sin is faith.

Ishikawa was a poet of great ability who wanted to develop critical 'realism', but dealt too 'emotively' with human suffering and was isolated from the mainstream of socialist activity. He was passionately in sympathy with the latter, but is marked down as a 'romantic'.