Page:History of Corea, ancient and modern; with description of manners and customs, language and geography (1879).djvu/225

 BUDDHISM GBOWa 201 the prefecture of Yclofoo, with five sub-prefectures, — ^their chief also being nominated governor. All those magistrates, who presided over the eastern half of what is now called Inner Mongolia, were placed under the care of the Yowchow governor. In the winter of 654, the governor of Soongmo routed a combined Gaoli and Mogo army at Sinchung of Liaotung, which was on its way to harry his lands. After the Tang d}masty had exhausted itself in crushing Gaoli to the ground, the Kitan gave evidence of a desire for a course of independent action, which boded no good to the north of China. The Tang emperor was compelled, in 714, to order the governor of Yingchow to march. But the watchman slept ; and before he got to his post at Yingchow, the Kitan pounced upon and defeated him, driving him westwards to the city of Yiiyang; as the modern Pingku, 150 -li north of Peking, was called. Soth Yingchow and Liwchung fell into the hands of Kitan, who, having " drawn blood,'' saw greater things before them. Just then Buddhism, introduced some time before from India through Tibet into China, where it took centuries to make itself felt, received an extraordinaiy impetus. A universal craze spread among high and low to become the inmates of devotional and chanting monasteries. Generals forsook their armies, ministers their portfolios, members of the imperial family their palaces, and merchants their business and their families, to build or dwell in monasteries, away from the clash of arms, the cares of state, or the din and bustle of life. So general did the contagion become, that memorial after memorial came pouring in upon the emperor, who felt compelled to take action, and to send out orders which recalled 12,000 vowed monks to their duties, and prevented the building of additional monasterie& "So European monarch acted so during the monkish crazes. Mogo,* in the far east, was, it was reported to the emperor, as eager as ever to lean on the arm of the Tang, for they were more than ever exposed to the fiery visits of the Tookue chief Mocho ; but now that Yingchow was fallen, they had no place
 * The then name taken by the ancient Sooshnn. (Map II. )