1889.] PUBLIC DOCUMENT — No. 4. 103 



to the discourse of the priest ^vith which the exercises gen- 

 erally closed, I would almost believe myself in a Roman 

 Catholic church. 



The ceremonials of the so-called native religion, Shinto, 

 which signifies " the way of the gods," and which Buddhism 

 found there on its introduction in the sixth century, still 

 have much in common with that which Buddha himself is 

 said to have found in India nearly twelve centuries earlier. 



Edwin Arnold, in his " Light of Asia," gives us this pict- 

 ure : — 



" For, on a dawn, he walked there and beheld 

 The householder Sihgala, newly bathed, 

 Bowing himself with bare head to the earth. 

 To heaven, and all four quartei'S, Avhile he threw 

 Rice, red and white, from both hands. 'Wherefore thus 

 Bowest thou, brother? ' said the lord ; and he, — 



' It is the way, great sir ! Our fathers taught. 

 At every dawn, before the toil begins. 

 To hold off evil from the sky above 

 And earth beneath, and all the winds which blow.' " 



The same ceremony of throwing "rice, red and white, 

 from both hands," bowing " with bare head to the earth, to 

 heaven and all four quarters," I have often witnessed at the 

 Shinto temples of the government on the celebration of the 

 festival Niiname, the Japanese thanksgiving day, as well as 

 on other occasions, concerning which the same explanation 

 was given me by a native priest who took part therein ; that 

 is to say, to propitiate the evil spirits, or to " hold off evil " 

 in the Rikugo, the six sides of the universe. 



A Japanese acquaintance of mine, who, as interpreter, ac- 

 companied the great embassy from Japan to America in 

 1872, was asked the difference between Buddhism and 

 Shinto. He said, " We imported Buddhism, but Shinto 

 we created." In truth, Shinto is the mythological religious 

 inheritance which the Japanese brought to their island 

 domain in prehistoric times, while Buddhism followed them 

 there later on, as it overspread half the inhabited world. 



In connection with the scattering of rice and the offering 

 of food before the altar and mirror in their temples, the 

 ceremony of sweeping out the evil spirits from the six sides 

 of the universe is first performed. For this purpose, the de- 



