rring daimi[=o]s, even the proud lord of Satsuma,[10] to
yield to his power, until the civil minister of the emperor, reverently
bowing, could say: "All under Heaven, Peace." Now, Japan had once more a
central government, intensely jealous and despotic, and with it the new
religion must sooner or later reckon. Religion apart from politics was
unknown in the Land of the Gods.

Yet, in order to employ the vast bodies of armed men hitherto accustomed
to the trade of war, and withal jealous of China and hostile to Korea,
Hideyoshi planned the invasion of the little peninsular kingdom by these
veterans whose swords were restless in their scabbards. After months of
preparation, he despatched an army in two great divisions, one under the
Christian general Konishi, and one under the Buddhist general Kato.
After a brilliant campaign of eighteen days, the rivals, taking
different routes, met in the Korean capital. In the masterly campaign
which followed, the Japanese armies penetrated almost to the extreme
northern boundary of the kingdom. Then China came to the rescue and the
Japanese were driven southward.

During the six or seven years of war, while the invaders crossed swords
with the natives and their Chinese allies, and devastated Korea to an
extent from which she has never recovered, there were Jesuit
missionaries attending the Japanese armies. It is not possible or even
probable, however, that any seeds of Christianity were at this time left
in the peninsula. Korean Christianity sprang up nearly two centuries
later, wind-wafted from China.[11]

During the war there was always more or less of jealousy, mostly
military and personal, between Konishi and Kato, which however was
aggravated by the priests on either side. Kato, being then and afterward
a fierce champion of the Buddhists, glorified in his orthodoxy, which
was that of the Nichiren sect. He went into battle with a banneret full
of texts, stuck in his back and flying behind him. His example was
copied by hundreds of his officers and soldiers. On their flags and
guidons was inscribed the famous apostrophe of the Nichiren sect, so
often heard in their services and revivals to-day (Namu miy[=o] ho ren
ge ki[=o]), and borrowed from the Saddharma Pundarika: "Glory be to the
salvation-bringing Lotus of the True Law."

The Hostility of Hideyoshi.

Konishi, on the other hand, was less numerously and perhaps less
influentially backed by, and made the champion of, th