The author of Fo-tsu-t'ung-ki, after describing the life of Buddha in four chapters, gives an account of the twenty-four patriarchs in his fifth chapter, and of nine selected patriarchs in his sixth and seventh chapters. Among the nine, Nagarjuna is the only foreigner, and the eight natives are not any of them among the five regular successors of Bodhidharma. Among them were (r.) Kau Hwei-wen, A.D. 550; (2.) Li Hwei-si, founder of the Nan-ngo school; (3.) Chen Chi-k'ai of T'ien-t'ai and founder of that school. The five others I shall not mention.

Then he selects eight others. After this he gives the

history of the succession in each case till he has related the lives of an immense number of teachers of schools, large and small, important and unimportant. After this he finds room for the school of Bodhidharma, on which, however, he is rather brief.

The author of San-kiau-yi-su places Bodhidharma in a much more important and elevated position. If Chi-p'an's view is a better representation of the old and orthodox Buddhist opinion, that of this later book is a better indication of the most prevalent opinions of modern Chinese monks.

Orthodox Buddhism has in China slowly but steadily become heterodox. The Buddhism of books and ancient traditions has become the Buddhism of mystic contemplation. The followers of Bodhidharma have extended themselves on every hand, and gained an almost complete victory over steady orthodoxy.

The history of ancient schools springing up long ago in the Buddhist communities of India, can now be only very partially recovered. Possibly some light may be thrown back by China upon the religious history of the country from which Buddhism came. In no part of the story is aid to the recovery of this lost knowledge more likely to be found than in the accounts of the patriarchs, the line of whom was completed by Bodhidharma. In seeking the best explanation of the Chinese and Japanese narrative of the patriarchs, and the seven Buddhas terminating in Gautama or Shakyamuni, it is important to know the Jain traditions as they were early in the sixth century of our era, when the patriarch Bodhidharma removed to China.

If it occur as an objection to this hypothesis that the discrepancies now existing between the school of Bodhidharma and of the Hindoo Jains are very great, the latter having temples and an external worship, and that their chronology also differs, in reply, it may be observed that the fame and influence of Bodhidharma in China mark