WEAKNESS OF JAPANESE BUDDHISM.
By John R. Mott
For many centuries Buddhism has been the great religion of Japan, but during the last nine or ten years it has manifested special activity and vigor. This is the result of the spread of Christianity and the wide diffusion of education. Among the evidences of this awakening are a revival in the study of Buddhism, the rebuilding of temples, the education of priests in certain sects, and the adoption of some of the methods of Christianity. The chief hold of Buddhism is on the lower classes of Japan, who are so completely under the sway of its countless superstitions. It is a striking fact that it has no hold whatever on the educated classes. Among the large number of students and teachers whom we met personally on our extended tour through Japan, we did not meet one who would call himself a Buddhist. The signs of the weakness of Buddhism are everywhere apparent. It is greatly rent with internal dissensions. Its priesthood has been so illiterate that the government about two years ago issued an order requiring that priests receive the equivalent of a common school education before being licensed. All bore testimony also to the shockingly immoral lives of the priests. As a class they seem to be corrupt through and through. It is said that the chief priest of the largest sect lives an openly vile life. The condition of things is so bad that even the secular press has warned the priests to reform or Buddhism must go down before Christianity.—John R. Mott.