“Amitabha is the fourth Dhyani or celestial Budda:  Padma-pani his AEon and executive minister. Padma-pani is the praesens Divus and creator of the existing system of worlds.  Hence his identification with the third member of the Triad.  He is figured as a graceful youth, erect, and bearing in either hand a lotos and a jewel.  The last circumstance explains the meaning of the celebrated Shadakshari Mantra, or six-lettered invocation of him, viz., Om!  Manipadme hom! of which so many corrupt versions and more corrupt interpretations have appeared from Chinese, Tibetan, Mongolian, and other sources.  The mantra in question is one of three, addressed to the several members of the Triad. 1. Om sarva vidye hom. 2. Om Prajnaye hom. 3. Om mani-padme hom. 1.  The mystic triform Deity is in the all-wise (Buddha). 2.  The mystic triform Deity is in Prajna (Dharma). 3.  The mystic triform Deity is in him of the jewel and lotos (Sangha).  But the praesens Divus, whether he be Augustus or Padma-pani, is everything with the many.  Hence the notoriety of this mantra, whilst the others are hardly ever heard of, and have thus remained unknown to our travellers.”—­The Phoenix, Vol.  II., p. 64.]

[Footnote 28:  “Nine centuries after Buddha, Maitreya (Miroku or Ji-shi) came down from the Tushita heaven to the lecture-hall in the kingdom of Ayodhya (A-ya-sha) in Central India, at the request of the Bodhisattva Asamga (Mu-jaku) and discoursed five Sastras, 1, Yoga-karya-bhumi-sastra (Yu-ga-shi-ji-ron), etc....  After that, the two great Sastra teachers, Asanga and Vasubandhu (Se-shin), who were brothers, composed many Sastras (Ron) and cleared up the meaning of the Mahayana” (or Greater Vehicle, canon of Northern Buddhism).—­B.N., p. 32.]

[Footnote 29:  Buddhism, T. Rhys Davids, pp. 206-211.]

[Footnote 30:  Prayer-wheels in Japan are used by the Tendai and Shingon sects, but without written prayers attached, and rather as an illustration of the doctrine of cause and effect (ingwa); the prayers being usually offered to Jizo the merciful.—­S. and H., p. 29; T. J., p. 360.]

[Footnote 31:  For this see Edkins’s Chinese Buddhism; Eitel’s Three Lectures, and Hand-book; Rev. S. Beal’s Buddhism, and A Catena of Buddhist Scriptures from the Chinese; The Romantic Legend of Sakya Buddha, from the Chinese; Texts from the Buddhist canon commonly known as the Dhammapeda; Notes on Buddhist Words and Phrases, the Chrysanthemum, Vol.  I.; The Phoenix, Vols.  I-III.

See, also, a spirited sketch of Ancient Japan, by Frederick Victor Dickins, in the Life of Sir Harry Parkes, Vol.  II., pp. 4-14.]

[Footnote 32:  S. and H., pp. 289, 293; Chamberlain’s Hand-book for Japan, p. 220; Summer’s Notes on Osaka, T.A.S.J., Vol.  VIL, p. 382; Buddhism, and Traditions Concerning its Introduction into Japan, T.A.S.J., Vol.  XIV., p. 78.]