the learner. Also there are many varieties of special doctrine held by the different sects and sub-sects,--so that, to make any satisfactory outline of Buddhist ontology, it is necessary to shape a synthesis of the more important and non-conflicting among these many tenets. I need scarcely say that popular Buddhism does not include concepts such as we have been examining. The people hold to the simpler creed of a veritable transmigration of souls. The people understand Karma only as the law that makes the punishment or reward of faults committed in previous lives. The people do not trouble themselves about Nehan or Nirvana;[1] but they think much about heaven (Gokuraku), which the members of many sects believe can be attained immediately after this life by the spirits of the good. The

[1. Scarcely a day passes that I do not hear such words uttered as ingwa, gokuraku, gosho,--or other words referring to Karma, heaven, future life, past life, etc. But I have never heard a man or woman of the people use the word "Nehan;" and whenever I have ventured to question such about Nirvana, I found that its philosophical meaning was unknown. On the other hand, the Japanese scholar speaks of Nehan as the reality,--of heaven, either as a temporary condition or as a parable.]

followers of the greatest and richest of the modern sects--the Shinshu--hold that, by the invocation of Amida, a righteous person can pass at once after death to the great Paradise of the West,--the Paradise of the Lotos-Flower-Birth. I am taking no account of popular beliefs in this little study, nor of doctrines peculiar to any one sect only.

But there are many differences in the higher teaching as to the attainment of Nirvana. Some authorities hold that the supreme happiness can be won, or at least seen, even on this earth; while others declare that the present world is too corrupt to allow of a perfect life, and that only by winning, through good deeds, the privilege of rebirth into a better world, can men hope for opportunity to practice that holiness which leads to the highest bliss. The latter opinion, which posits the superior conditions of being in other worlds, better expresses the general thought of contemporary Buddhism in Japan.

The conditions of human and of animal being belong to what are termed the Worlds of Desire (Yoku-Kai),--which are four in