spiriting nature. It taught that salvation could not be
reached except by efforts continued through three immeasurable
periods of time. But Saicho acquired a new doctrine in China. From
the monastery of Tientai (Japanese, Tendai) he carried back to
Hiei-zan a creed founded on the "Lotus of the Good Law"--a creed that
salvation is at once attainable by a knowledge of the Buddha nature,
and that such knowledge may be acquired by meditation and wisdom.
That was the basic conception, but it underwent some modification at
Japanese hands. It became "a system of Japanese eclecticism, fitting
the disciplinary and meditative methods of the Chinese sage to the
pre-existing foundations of earlier sects."* This is not the place to
discuss details of religious doctrine, but the introduction of the
Tendai belief has historical importance. In the first place, it
illustrates a fact which may be read between the lines of all
Japanese annals, namely, that the Japanese are never blind borrowers
from foreign systems: their habit is "to adapt what they borrow so as
to fit it to what they possess." In the second place, the Tendai
system became the parent of nearly all the great sects subsequently
born in Japan. In the third place, the Buddhas of Contemplation, by
whose aid the meditation of absolute truth is rendered possible,
suggested the idea that they had frequently been incarnated for the
welfare of mankind, and from that theory it was but a short step to
the conviction that "the ancient gods whom the Japanese worshipped
are but manifestations of these same mystical beings, and that the
Buddhist faith had come, not to destroy the native Shinto, but to
embody It into a higher and more universal system. From that moment
the triumph of Buddhism was secured."** It is thus seen that the
visit of Saicho (Dengyo Daishi) to China at the beginning of the
ninth century and the introduction of the Tendai creed into Japan
constitute landmarks in Japanese history.

*Developments of Japanese Buddhism, by the Rev. A. Lloyd. M. A.

**The doctrines that the Shinto deities were incarnations of the
Buddhas of Contemplation (Dhyani) had already been enunciated by
Gyogi but its general acceptance dates from the days of Dengyo
Daishi. The doctrine was called honchi-suishaku.

ENGRAVING: PRIEST KOKAI, AFTERWARD KNOWN AS KOBO DAISHI

KOBO DAISHI

Contemporary with and even greater in the eyes of his countrymen than
Dengyo Daishi, was Kobo Daishi (known a