A poem in the Man’yōshū, book 13, number 3253, begins: Ashihara no mizuho no kuni wa kamunagara kotoage senu kuni. The land of reed plains and rice, following the will of the gods, is a land where people do not need to put their wishes into words.
The poem then turns: shikaredomo kotoage zo wa ga suru. But I, for my part, do speak out.