seemed one -- a unity fostered by the mystic worship
of the Absolute, with its conception of illusion and its
mysterious glimpses of the real world behind the veil
of sense.

Still other elements entered in. It was the Court
which first welcomed Buddhism, and the conversion of
the nation began with its chiefs. The Church of the
powerful, the wealthy, and the aristocratic became
powerful, wealthy, and aristocratic. Heads of the
great families became abbots, and emperors retired
into monasteries. The "merit" gained through thus
becoming "religious" influenced the imagination, al-
ready before the close of the Nihongi we see how
powerfully. Other motives also operated -- the influ-
ence of the world corrupting "other-worldly" religion.
For surely no corruption is greater than this, the ad-
mission on false pretences of that which has been for-
mally expelled. The world had been cast out and
repudiated, but wealth, power, the gratification of the
senses, the longing for a luxurious life of retiracy, and
the example of the aristocracy led to the adoption of
a religious life from irreligious motives, and the abode
of monks became the home of worldliness.

The condition is reflected in the literature of the
eleventh and twelfth centuries. It shows a civilisation
effeminate, luxurious, immoral, without earnestness or
purpose, religious certainly, but with a religion which

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