[paragraph continues] God-conception is subject to various interpretations; and the Buddhist notion of Dharmakaya, I venture to say, somewhat corresponds to the Johannean view of God. Intelligent Christians, I think, are well aware of the fact that the Gospel of John strikes quite an independent key among the Synoptics. Philosophically speaking, it rings with a pantheistic note, while the other gospels are monotheistic, true to the Jewish tradition. Buddhism has a pantheistic tendency, too, and in this respect the Gospel of John may be considered echoing somewhat the Buddhist sentiment.

Buddhists do not think that God has any special abode, that his administration of the universe comes from a certain fixed center or headquarters, where he-sits in his august throne surrounded by angels and archangels and saints and pious spirits who have been admitted there through his grace. In short, the Buddhist God is not above us, nor below us, but right in the midst of us; and if we want to see him face to face, we are able to find him in the lilies of the field, in the fowls of the air, in the murmuring mountain streams; we can trace his footsteps in the sea, we can follow him as he rides upon the storm; we can meet him in the bush; indeed, wheresoever we may turn, we are sure to be greeted by the smiling countenance of the author of this universe. Who says, then, that God is in Heaven, in some unknown region where we

mortals are never allowed to venture in without his special permit?

This God of Buddhism works constantly and everlastingly; he knows no rest, no fatigue, he has not to stop his work after six days of toil; he does not resort to any special revelation in order to announce his existence to the world; he has no favored son to sacrifice for the sake of the sin of which the poor innocent child has no conception. On the other hand, the Buddhist God is able to turn the meanest creature in the world to the noblest figure in which his glory is manifest to its full extent. He can destroy this whole universe and raise it again in the twinkling of an eye, it not being necessary for him to wait even for three days. His revelation is not an historical event, but it is happening every minute, and those who have eyes see it, those who have ears hear it. And to know the truth of this, it is only necessary to cleanse the heart of its egoistic impurities and defilements, which have been accumulating by virtue of our subjective ignorance. When this fundamental purification is completed, "we all, with unveiled face reflecting as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image, from glory to glory." Again, we are glorified with the "glory which he had with him before the world was." When we arrive at this exalted stage of spiritual enlightenment, Buddhism declares that we have attained Nirvana. (Most Christian critics have