Page:The World's Parliament of Religions Vol 1.djvu/229

 IMPORTANCE OF RELIGION. 201 the universalism of Buddha's teaching, its profound humanity, and its two stages, of enlightenment of the intellect and eleva- tion to Buddhahood. A paper of the sixth day by B. Yatsubuchi, of Japan, pre- sented Buddhism as a religion aiming to turn men from the incomplete world of popular superstition to the complete enlightenment of the world of truth. Another Japanese Buddhist, Shaku Soyen, set forth on the eighth day the demands of Buddha's way of salvation for honesty, humanity, justice, and kindness, as conditions of eternal weal and security against eternal woe; and on the six- teenth day Hori Toki, also of Japan, expounded the two-fold purpose of Buddhist religion, to teach the truth of doctrine and to guide the goodness and righteousness of mankind, and Buddha's broad liberality towards all faiths as varying guises of universal truth. The Japanese representative of Shintoism of the Zhikko type. Rev. Reuchi Shibata, explained in a third-day paper the limitation of their religion to respect for the present world and its pfactical works rather than any future world, and its atten- tion to public interests and prayers for the long life of the emperor. The Jain faith was expounded on the fifteenth day by V. A. Ghandi, as giving religion a wholly ethical turn, in view of the eight Karmas, or varieties of Karmon (inevitable result) which follow the law of cause and effect. The Parsee view of the nature and significance of religion, as set forth in the essay by E. S. D. Bharucha, of Bombay, turns on the assumption that the soul can be saved only by success in the battle of life, that no such thing as vicarious sal- vation is possible, and that the aids given by God for struggle and conquest are ample and sure for every faithful soul. The Confucian idea of the nature and importance of relig- ion, as expounded in an elaborate third-day paper by Pung Kwang Yu, begins with accepting as fixed and irremediable the innate imperfections of the human species, and proposes the mending of imperfection by means of intellectual pursuits.