[Footnote 1066:  I do not know whether the ceremonies of the other sects offer the same resemblance.  Probably they have all imitated the Gelugpa.  Some authors attribute the resemblance to contact with Nestorian Christianity in early times but the resemblance is definitely to Roman costumes and ceremonies not to those of the Eastern church.  Is there any reason to believe that the Nestorian ritual resembled that of western catholics?]

[Footnote 1067:  See also Filchner, Das Kloster Kumbum, 1906.]

[Footnote 1068:  Almost the only difference that I have noticed is that whereas Tibetans habitually translate Indian proper names, Mongols frequently use Sanskrit words, such as Manjusri, or slightly modified forms such as Dara, Maidari (=Tara, Maitreya).  The same practice is found in the old Uigur translations.  See Bibl.  Buddh. XII.  Tisastvustik.  For an interesting account of contemporary Lamaism in Mongolia see Binstead, “Life in a Khalkha Steppe Monastery,” J.R.A.S. 1914, 847-900.]

CHAPTER LIV

JAPAN

This work as originally planned contained a section on Japanese Buddhism consisting of three chapters, but after it had been sent to the publishers I was appointed H.M.  Ambassador in Tokyo and I decided to omit this section.  Let not any Japanese suppose that it contained disparaging criticism of his country or its religions.  It would, I hope, have given no offence to either Buddhists or Shintoists, but an ambassador had better err on the side of discretion and refrain from public comments on the institutions of the country to which he is accredited.

The omission is regrettable in so far as it prevents me from noticing some of the most interesting and beautiful developments of Buddhism, but for historical purposes and the investigation of the past the loss is not great, for Japanese Buddhism throws little light on ancient India or even on ancient China.  It has not influenced other countries.  Its interest lies not in the relics of antiquity which it has preserved but in the new shape and setting which a race at once assimilative and inventive has given to old ideas.

Though the doctrine of the Buddha reached Japan from China through Korea,[1069] Chinese and Japanese Buddhism differ in several respects.  Lamaism never gained a footing in Japan, probably because it was the religion of the hated Mongols.  There was hardly any direct intercourse with India.  Whereas the state religion of China was frequently hostile to Buddhism, in Japan such relations were generally friendly and from the seventh century until the Meiji era an arrangement known as Ryo-bu Shinto or two-fold Shinto was in force, by which Shinto shrines were with few exceptions handed over to the custody of Buddhist priests, native deities and historical personages being declared to be manifestations of various Buddhas and Bodhisattvas.  Again, Buddhism in Japan has had a more intimate connection with social, political and even military matters in various periods than in China.  This is one reason for its chief characteristic, namely, the large number and distinct character of its sects.  They are not merely schools like the religious divisions of India and China, but real sects with divergent doctrines and sometimes antagonistic to one another.