Apostles. The Cross took the place of the _torii_. It was
emblazoned on the helmets and banners of the warriors, and
embroidered on their breasts. The Japanese soldiers went forth
to battle like Christian crusaders. In the roadside shrine
Kuanon, the Goddess of Mercy, made way for the Virgin, the
mother of God. Buddhism was beaten with its own weapons. Its own
artillery was turned against it. Nearly all the Christian
churches were native temples, sprinkled and purified. The same
bell, whose boom had so often quivered the air announcing the
orisons and matins of paganism, was again blessed and sprinkled,
and called the same hearers to mass and confession; the same
lavatory that fronted the temple served for holy water or
baptismal font; the same censer that swung before Amida could be
refilled to waft Christian incense; the new convert could use
unchanged his old beads, bells, candles, incense, and all the
paraphernalia of his old faith in celebration of the new.

"Almost everything that is distinctive in the Roman form of
Christianity is to be found in Buddhism: images, pictures,
lights, altars, incense, vestments, masses, beads, wayside
shrines, monasteries, nunneries, celibacy, fastings, vigils,
retreats, pilgrimages, mendicant vows, shorn heads, orders,
habits, uniforms, nuns, convents, purgatory, saintly and
priestly intercession, indulgences, works of supererogation,
pope, archbishops, abbots, abbesses, monks, neophytes, relics
and relic-worship, exclusive burial-ground, etc., etc.,
etc."[21]

Nevertheless, these resemblances are almost wholly superficial, and have
little or nothing to do with genuine religion. Such matters are of