d
good sense had a large measure of success in banishing extravagance
from art and literature. Yet, alas, the intellectual life of China
lost more in fire and brilliancy than it gained in sanity. Probably
the most critical times for literature and indeed for thought were
those brief periods under the Sui and T'ang[641] when Buddhist and
Taoist books were accepted as texts for the public examinations and
the last half century of the Northern Sung, when the educational
reforms of Wang An Shih were intermittently in force. The innovations
were cancelled in all cases. Had they lasted, Chinese style and
mentality might have been different.

The T'ang dynasty, though on the whole favourable to Buddhism, and
indeed the period of its greatest prosperity, opened with a period of
reaction. To the founder, Kao Tsu, is attributed the saying that
Confucianism is as necessary to the Chinese as wings to a bird or
water to a fish. The imperial historiographer Fu I[642] presented to
his master a memorial blaming Buddhism because it undervalued natural
relationships and urging that monks and nuns should be compelled to
marry. He was opposed by Hsiao Yu,[643] who declared that hell was
made for such people as his opponent--an argument common to many
religions. The Emperor followed on the whole advice of Fu I.
Magistrates were ordered to inquire into the lives of monks and nuns.
Those found pure and sincere were collected in the large
establishments. The rest were ordered to return to the world and the
smaller religious houses were closed. Kao Tsu abdicated in 627 but his
son Tai Tsung continued his religious policy, and the new Empress was
strongly anti-Buddhist, for when mortally ill she forbade her son to
pray for her recovery in Buddhist shrines. Yet the Emperor cannot have
shared these sentiments at any rate towards the end of his reign.[644]
He issued an edict allowing every monastery to receive five new monks
and the celebrated journey of Hsuan Chuang[645] was made in his
reign. When the pilgrim returned from India, he was received with
public honours and a title was conferred on him. Learned monks were
appointed to assist him in translating the library he had brought back
and the account of his travels was presented to the Emperor who also
wrote a laudatory preface to his version of the Prajnaparamita. It was
in this reign also that Nestorian missionaries first appeared in China
and were allowed to settle in the capital. Diplomati