hought about it. He is the
true keeper of the Sutra."--Zitsuzen Ashitsu of the Tendai sect.

"It [Buddhism] is idealistic. Everything is as we think it. The
world is my idea.... Beyond our faith is naught. Hold the
Buddhist to his creed and insist that such logic destroys
itself, and he triumphs smilingly, 'Self-destructive! Of course
it is. All logic is. That is the centre of my philosophy.'"

"It [Buddhism] denounces all desire and offers salvation as the
reward of the murder of our affections, hopes, and aspirations.
It is possible where conscious existence is believed to be the
chief of evils."--George William Knox.

"Swallowing the device of the priests, the people well
satisfied, dance their prayers."--Japanese Proverb.

"The wisdom that is from above is ... without variance, without
hypocrisy."--James.

"The mystery of God, even Christ in whom are all the treasures
of wisdom and knowledge."--Paul.

CHAPTER VIII - NORTHERN BUDDHISM IN ITS DOCTRINAL EVOLUTIONS

Chronological Outline.

In sketching the history of the doctrinal developments of Buddhism in
Japan, we note that the system, greatly corrupted from its original
simplicity, was in 552 A.D. already a millennium old. Several distinct
phases of the much-altered faith of Gautama, were introduced into the
islands at various times between the sixth and the ninth century. From
these and from others of native origin have sprung the larger Japanese
sects. Even as late as the seventeenth century, novelties in Buddhism
were imported from China, and the exotics took root in Japanese soil;
but then, with a single exception, only to grow as curiosities in the
garden, rather than as the great forests, which had already sprung from
imported and native specimens.

We may divide the period of the doctrinal development of Buddhism in
Japan into four epochs:

I. The first, from 552 to 805 A.D., will cover the first six sects,
which had for their centre of propagation, Nara, the southern capital.

II. Then follows Riy[=o]bu Buddhism, from the ninth to the twelfth
centuries.

III. This was succeeded by another explosion of doctrine wholly and
peculiarly Japanese, and by a wide missionary propagation.

IV. From the sixteenth to the nineteenth century, there is little that
is doctrinally noticeable, until our own time, when the new Buddhism of
to-day claims at least a passing notice.

The Japanes