minister to the wants of all. He is often represented as a
monk, staff in hand and with shaven head. The origin of this guise is
not clear and it perhaps refers to his previous births. But in the
eighth century a monk of Chiu Hua[70] was regarded as an incarnation
of Ti-tsang and after death his body was gilded and enshrined as an
object of worship. In later times the Bodhisattva was confused with
the incarnation, in the same way as the portly figure of Pu-tai,
commonly known as the laughing Buddha, has been substituted for
Maitreya in Chinese iconography.

In Japan the cult of the six Jizos became very popular. They were
regarded as the deities of roads[71] and their effigies ultimately
superseded the ancient phallic gods of the crossways. In this martial
country the Bodhisattva assumed yet another character as Shogun Jizo,
a militant priest riding on horseback[72] and wearing a helmet who
became the patron saint of warriors and was even identified with the
Japanese war god, Hachiman. Until the seventeenth century Jizo was
worshipped principally by soldiers and priests, but subsequently his
cult spread among all classes and in all districts. His benevolent
activities as a guide and saviour were more and more emphasized: he
heals sickness, he lengthens life, he leads to heaven, he saves from
hell: he even suffers as a substitute in hell and is the special
protector of the souls of children amid the perils of the underworld.
Though this modern figure of Jizo is wrought with ancient materials,
it is in the main a work of Japanese sentiment.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 5: In dealing with the Mahayanists, I use the expression
Sakyamuni in preference to Gotama. It is their own title for the
teacher and it seems incongruous to use the purely human name of
Gotama in describing doctrines which represent him as superhuman.]

[Footnote 6: But Kings Hsin-byu-shin of Burma and Sri Suryavamsa Rama
of Siam have left inscriptions recording their desire to become
Buddhas. See my chapters on Burma and Siam below. Mahayanist ideas may
easily have entered these countries from China, but even in Ceylon the
idea of becoming a Buddha or Bodhisattva is not unknown. See _Manual
of a Mystic_ (P.T.S. 1916), pp. xviii and 140.]

[Footnote 7: _E.g._ in Itivuttakam 75, there is a description of the
man who is like a drought and gives nothing, the man who is like rain
in a certain district and the man who is Sabbabhutanukampako,
compassionate to