  Nishida composed essays on interrelated themes rather than sequential and tightly edited books. Major essays were subsequently collected and published as books, but often do not form chapters of a single coherent work. Instead of investigating a problem in a series of straightforward linear arguments, he tended to write in spirals that kept circling back on previous formulations and reworking them in new contexts. His style is akin to the manner in which one repeatedly practices a traditional Japanese art like calligraphy, poetry or even Zen mediation: working at a particular activity or expression, getting better and better at it without erasing one’s previous attempts. It is possible, however, to discern four methods that pervade his philosophy and make it easier for the reader to follow the train of his thought.