Page:Madras Journal of Literature and Science, series 1, volume 6 (1837).djvu/17

1837.] India with the view of bringing the most learned of their Buddhist priests into China to explain more fully the original tenets of their sect, a purpose from which his minister Wang-Fang-Ming, who was a man of letters and a philosopher, attempted to dissuade him in an eloquent address, wherein allusion is made to the tenets of Fuh as a religion which had its origin in the distant countries of the west, and to Fuh himself as being the sacred sage of foreigners. It may be here remarked that the Chinese have no character whose initial sound corresponds with B; consequently their pronunciation of the word Buddh would be P’hudh, or Fut, Fuh. The emperor Mingti, who is supposed to have flourished during the first century after Christ, sent ambassadors into India, in consequence of a saying of Confucius, via. that the most holy was to be found in the west, who returned with the books and doctrines of Buddha. These did not make much way against the doctrines of Confucius until about 518 A. D. when a Buddhist priest named Darma or D′herma (an Indian name) came into China from Seitensku which, says Kæmpfer, according to Japanese explanation, means, that part of the world which lies westwards of Japan. On the island of Honan there is a large Buddhist temple called the Fut-kaon, containing many inscriptions indicating the origin of their religion. For instance Hoe-teen Fok-te the "happy region near the sea." Nam-teen-fut-kwok "the nation of Buddha in the southern region."—Hoe-van Poo-te "the god Buddha on the shores of the sea." Three large images of the Jam-pow-fut. The three precious Buddhas, past, present, and future. In this temple there is a single image of Amida (immeasurable) Buddha; in Chinese called O-mi-to-Fuh-ti.

Corea.—Shortly after the appearance of the Buddhist priest Darma in China, Buddhism made rapid progress to the east. The first idol to Buddha in the peninsula of Fakkusai or Corea was erected in 543 A. D. Professor Wilson states the introduction of this religion into Corea to have taken place A. D. 530.

From Corea it may be traced to Japan and the Chusan group; one of which, the island of Poo-to, was visited lately by Mr. Gutzlaff the missionary. The immense number of Buddhist temples and priests, sixty two of the former and two thousand of the latter, on this small island, the area of which does not exceed 12 miles, can only be accounted for by supposing it to be a place of peculiar sanctity where Buddha is supposed to have first made his appearance. This is corroborated by the large inscriptions hewn in rocks of solid granite, and the many gigantic statues of Buddha. The highly picturesque