In the course of many years' investigation of haunted houses, I have naturally come in contact with numerous people who have had first-hand experiences with the Occult. Nurse Mackenzie is one of these people. I met her for the first time last... Read more of The Ghost Of The Hindoo Child Or The Hauntings Of The White Dove Hotel Near St Swithin's Street Aberdeen at Scary Stories.ca

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Samurai

The Parable Of A Drunkard
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The Errors Of Philosophical Pessimists And Religious Optimists
Philosophical pessimists[FN#214] maintain that there are on e...

The Honest Poverty Of The Zen Monk And The Samurai
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The Sermon Of The Inanimate
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Zazen Or The Sitting In Meditation
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The Eternal Life As Taught By Professor Munsterberg
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Life Change And Hope
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Transformation and change are the essential features of life;...

Man Is Good-natured According To Mencius
Oriental scholars, especially the Chinese men of letters, se...

The Ancient Buddhist Pantheon

The ancient Buddhist pantheon was full of deities or Buddhas,
3,000[FN#137] in number, or rather countless, and also of
Bodhisattvas no less than Buddhas. Nowadays, however, in every
church of Mahayanism one Buddha or another together with some
Bodhisattvas reigns supreme as the sole object of worship, while
other supernatural beings sink in oblivion. These Enlightened
Beings, regardless of their positions in the pantheon, were generally
regarded as persons who in their past lives cultivated virtues,
underwent austerities, and various sorts of penance, and at length
attained to a complete Enlightenment, by virtue of which they secured
not only peace and eternal bliss, but acquired divers supernatural
powers, such as clairvoyance, clairaudience, all-knowledge, and what
not. Therefore, it is natural that some Mahayanists[FN#138] came to
believe that, if they should go through the same course of discipline
and study, they could attain to the same Enlightenment and Bliss, or
the same Buddhahood, while other Mahayanists[FN#139] came to believe
in the doctrine that the believer is saved and led up to the eternal
state of bliss, without undergoing these hard disciplines, by the
power of a Buddha known as having boundless mercy and fathomless
wisdom whom he invokes.

[FN#137] Trikalpa-trisahasra-buddhanrama-sutra gives the names of
3,000 Buddhas, and Buddhabhisita-buddhanama-sutra enumerates Buddhas
and Bodhisattvas 11,093 in number. See Nanjo's Catalogue, Nos. 404,
405, 406, 407.

[FN#138] Those who believe in the doctrine of Holy Path. See 'A
History of the Twelve Japanese Buddhist Sects,' pp. 109-111.

[FN#139] Those who believe in the doctrine of the Pure Land.

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