Besides the ordinary ancestor-worship (as distinct from the State
worship) the people took to Buddhism and Taoism, which became
the popular religions, and the _literati_ also honoured the gods
of these two sects. Buddhist deities gradually became installed in
Taoist temples, and the Taoist immortals were given seats beside the
Buddhas in their sanctuaries. Every one patronized the god who seemed
to him the most popular and the most lucrative. There even came to
be united in the same temple and worshipped at the same altar the
three religious founders or figure-heads, Confucius, Buddha, and Lao
Tzu. The three religions were even regarded as forming one whole,
or at least, though different, as having one and the same object:
_san êrh i yeh_, or _han san wei i_, "the three are one," or "the
three unite to form one" (a quotation from the phrase _T'ai chi han
san wei i_ of Fang Yü-lu: "When they reach the extreme the three are
seen to be one"). In the popular pictorial representations of the
pantheon this impartiality is clearly shown.


The Super-triad

The toleration, fraternity, or co-mixture of the three
religions--ancestor-worship or Confucianism, Chinese Buddhism,
and Taoism--explains the compound nature of the triune head of
the Chinese pantheon. The numerous deities of Buddhism and Taoism
culminate each in a triad of gods (the Three Precious Ones and the
Three Pure Ones respectively), but the three religions jointly have
also a triad compounded of one representative member of each. This
general or super-triad is, of course, composed of Confucius, Lao Tzu,
and Buddha. This is the officially decreed order, though it is varied
occasionally by Buddha being placed in the centre (the place of honour)