were made dependent upon free-will offerings. Even
in our earliest sources a gift brought merit to the
giver, ¹ and before long such gifts assumed transcendent
importance -- better a gift of a trifle to a monk than a
fortune to the vulgar sick and poor. So was it pre-
eminently in Japan. The Government in the seventh
century endowed the temples, and great nobles and
emperors vied with each other in gifts. Hence as
early as the eighth century there are loud complaints
of the wealth and luxury of the orders, and of the
added burdens laid upon the laity; for the possessions
of the orders were freed from all burdens, and in their
vast extent became a grievous evils. ².

Thus the world came back and took possession of
the order devoted to the super-world. For not only
did the desire for merit stimulate gifts, but the re-
ligious emotions gave wide field for their employment.
The emotions of reverence and dependence, called first
into activity by nature, are fostered by art, for they
are akin to the æsthetic feelings. Hence come groves
and temples and gardens, and pictures and images,
and elaborate vestments and rituals, and elaborate or-
naments costly and magnificent. The wealth of the
Japanese artistic temperament poured itself out upon
the adornment of its religion, so that art and religion

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