The Three Kingdoms gave place to the Dynasty known as Western Tsin[613] which, for a short time (A.D. 265-316), claimed to unite the Empire, and we now reach the period when Buddhism begins to become prominent.  It is also a period of political confusion, of contest between the north and south, of struggles between Chinese and Tartars.  Chinese histories, with their long lists of legitimate sovereigns, exaggerate the solidity and continuity of the Empire, for the territory ruled by those sovereigns was often but a small fraction of what we call China.  Yet the Tartar states were not an alien and destructive force to the same extent as the conquests made by Mohammedan Turks at the expense of Byzantium.  The Tartars were neither fanatical, nor prejudiced against Chinese ideals in politics and religion.  On the contrary, they respected the language, literature and institutions of the Empire:  they assumed Chinese names and sometimes based their claim to the Imperial title on the marriage of their ancestors with Chinese princesses.

During the fourth century and the first half of the fifth some twenty ephemeral states, governed by Tartar chieftains and perpetually involved in mutual war, rose and fell in northern China.  The most permanent of them was Northern Wei which lasted till 535 A.D.  But the Later Chao and both the Earlier and Later Ts’in are important for our purpose.[614] Some writers make it a reproach to Buddhism that its progress, which had been slow among the civilized Chinese, became rapid in the provinces which passed into the hands of these ruder tribes.  But the phenomenon is natural and is illustrated by the fact that even now the advance of Christianity is more rapid in Africa than in India.  The civilization of China was already old and self-complacent:  not devoid of intellectual curiosity and not intolerant, but sceptical of foreign importations and of dealings with the next world.  But the Tartars had little of their own in the way of literature and institutions:  it was their custom to assimilate the arts and ideas of the civilized nations whom they conquered:  the more western tribes had already made the acquaintance of Buddhism in Central Asia and such native notions of religion as they possessed disposed them to treat priests, monks and magicians with respect.

Of the states mentioned, the Later Chao was founded by Shih-Lo[615] (273-332), whose territories extended from the Great Wall to the Han and Huai in the South.  He showed favour to an Indian monk and diviner called Fo-t’u-ch’eng[616] who lived at his court and he appears to have been himself a Buddhist.  At any rate the most eminent of his successors, Shih Chi-lung,[617] was an ardent devotee and gave general permission to the population to enter monasteries, which had not been granted previously.  This permission is noticeable, for it implies, even at this early date, the theory that a subject of the Emperor has no right to become a monk without his master’s leave.