12 "The Buddhists look upon the Bo-tree as most Christians have looked upon the Cross."--Rhys Davids' _Buddhism_, p. 37 note.
13 It is, no doubt, owing largely to the influence of Buddhism that the passion of _anger_ is almost unknown in Japan. In the same way, a Japanese, though the heart were well-nigh breaking, would consider it a most unworthy thing to let his grief betray itself.
14 Miss Isabella Bird (Mrs. Bishop), authoress of _Unbeaten Tracks in Japan_, well describes the impression produced on the spectator by the Daibutsus, or colossal images of Buddha, so common in Japan:--"He is not sleeping, he is not waking, he is not acting, he is not thinking, his consciousness is doubtful; he exists,--that is all; his work is done, a hazy beatitude, a negation remain. This is the Nirvana in which the devout Buddhist may aspire to participate."
The Daibutsu at Kamakura, of which an illustration is given opposite, is one of the largest in Japan. It is fifty feet high, and, as a work of art, is without a rival. The boss protruding from the forehead is supposed to represent a jewel, and to symbolize Illumination.
_ 15 History of the Jewish Church_, Vol. iii, Lecture xlv.
16 This is scarcely less true of Christianity; and it _must_ be true, in some measure, of every religious system which attempts to minister to the needs of beings, so differently constituted, and so dissimilarly circumstanced, as are the members of the human race. As we proceed in this chapter to refer to the various schools of Buddhism and their characteristics, we can hardly fail to have suggested to us, more than once, those different aspects of Christianity, which have been the occasion of all our "schools of thought," and, alas, of how many of our divisions!
17 Those who would investigate the subject further are referred to Alabaster's _The Modern Buddhist_ (Trübner, 1870).
18 For it is men only who inhabit this Celestial Region: women, worthy of attaining to it, have changed their sex.
20 Avalokitesvara="The Lord who looks down from heaven." The female form taking the place of the male is, no doubt, due to the idea of the woman's being supposed to be the more compassionate nature; just as, too often in the Christian Church, the Blessed Mother has, for a like reason, been made to encroach upon the prerogatives of her Divine Son. Instances are recorded of the Chinese, when conversing with Europeans, giving the name of _Kwanyin_ to the statues of the Blessed Virgin in the Roman Churches. (Davis' _The Chinese_, chap, xiv.)