Page:A handbook of modern Japan (IA handbookofmodern01clem).pdf/332

by ex-priests: "Something that did trouble me was the growing conviction that Buddhism was dead, that it had reached the extremity of corruption. Strife and scandal were rife everywhere. The chief priests . . . were grasping after worldly place and prosperity. Of the immorality of the priests it makes me blush to speak. It is not a rare thing to see men with shaven heads and attired in black garments wandering about in prostitute quarters, or to find women living in temples, or to discover fish-bones thrown among the graves. . . . The religion has no rallying power left, no inner life. . . . It has contributed much to our civilization in the past, but it is now exhausted."

One element of the strong hold which Buddhism had and has upon the people, even upon the educated classes, is the fact that so many cemeteries have been and are connected with Buddhist temples. It used to be a frequent saying that a Japanese was a Shintōist in life and a Buddhist in death; because, though he may never have espoused Buddhism, he might be laid away in his grave according to Buddhist ceremonies in a Buddhist temple and a Buddhist graveyard. But this control of the cemeteries seems to be passing out of Buddhist hands into the care of the local civil authorities. And this secularization, if it may be so called, of the graveyards not only abolishes the Buddhist monopoly, but also takes away from the priests the golden opportunity of extorting immense fees. The Buddhist control of cemeteries