To convert a line of theocratic
emperors, whose authority was derived from their alleged divine origin
and sacerdotal character, into patrons and propagandists of Buddhism,
and to transform indigenous Shint[=o] gods into Buddhas elect, or
Buddhas to come, or Buddhas in a former state of existence, were tasks
that might appall the most prodigious intellect, and even strain the
capacities of what one might imagine to be the universal religion for
all mankind.
Yet from such a task continental Buddhism had not shrunk before and did
not shrink then, nor indeed from it do the insular Japanese sects shrink
now. Indeed, Buddhism is quite ready to adopt, absorb and swallow up
Japanese Christianity. With all encompassing tentacles, and with
colossal powers of digestion and assimilation, Northern Buddhism had
drawn into itself a large part of the Brahmanism out of which it
originally sprang,[4] reversing the old myth of Chronos by swallowing
its parents. It had gathered in, pretty much all that was in the heavens
above and the earth beneath and the waters that were under the earth, in
Nepal, Tibet, China, and Korea. Thoroughly exercised and disciplined, it
was ready to devour and digest all that the imagination of Japan had
conceived.
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