The individual, the nation, the world, and the Kingdom of Buddha — these terms stand for different aspects of the one ideal. The Holy Catholic Church of Buddhism is to have the world, the whole cosmos, as its stage; while the cosmos is not to be conceived as a mere universe in space, but essentially exists in the heart of every true Buddhist. Buddha is the Father and Lord of the Kingdom, and his children should strive for the realization of the Kingdom both in their own lives and in the community of all beings.

‘Behold, the kingdom of God is within you!’ This was the creed of Nichiren also, witnessed by his life, confirmed by the Scripture, and supported by his metaphysical speculation. When he concentrated his thought on his own calling, he was in communion with the saints in the Lotus; when he expressed anxiety about his country, yet with confidence in its destiny, he was a prophet and an ideal patriot; when he reflected on his tranquil life among the mountains, he was almost a lyric poet, glorifying his surroundings by his religious vision; he was a scholastic philosopher when he interpreted the truths of existence and the nature of the religious community; and he was a mystic in his vision of the future realization of Buddhahood in himself and in the Kingdom of Buddha.

Nichiren’s thinking always aimed, as we have seen, to unite two opposites, and to explain either by reference to the other. This method was applied to the relation between the particular and the universal, between the world and the individual, between human nature and Buddhahood. So also with the Kingdom of Buddha. It is individual and universal at the same time; either aspect is incomplete apart from the other; individual perfection is inconceivable without the basis of the universal truth, while the universal community cannot exist apart from the spiritual enlightenment of every individual. The Kingdom means the complete working out of the harmonious relation of these two aspects of perfection — Buddhahood.

The man has appeared, and the stage is determined. A definite organization must now be provided for actually effecting the transformation according to the instructions given by the Prophet. This idea gradually crystallized in Nichiren’s mind into a definite plan for establishing the centre of the universal church, the Holy See, the Kaidan.

[T]o abstract a phase of Buddhist thought, apart from other factors, is as if one were to dissect a human body into parts, and treat one of them as a unit.

Applied to the fellowship of believers in the Buddhist Church, the same kind of reciprocity of benefaction and gratitude, of entrusting and perpetuation, exists between Nichiren and his followers forever. Consequently, the Church is the organ for perpetuating Nichiren’s ideals through the efforts of his followers.

The individual, as such, is neither real, in the commonly asserted sense of being a personally persistent entity, nor unreal, in the sense that it has no place in existence. It is unreal, be cause it is subject to constant change; but it is real, as a product of causation, as a manifestation of character accumulated by karma.

These teachings were expressed in words and preserved in writings, although to the Buddhist they were not merely letters or words, but truths, and therefore things, as well.

These things and conditions are not products of chance, but exist and change according to the definite order of laws, or truths. This order of truth is expressed pre-eminently by the law of causation, which is assumed by Buddhism to be universal and irrevocable throughout all changes of the world. “That being present, this comes to be; because that has arisen, this arises” — this is the key-note of the Buddhist view of the world.

Nichiren’s great aim was to achieve his ideal of the Catholic Church, with its centre in his own country. Believing that he was himself the man to do this, and that the true import and end of Buddhism had not been apprehended in earlier times, even in India, he saw in vision a return of Buddhism from Japan to India, and its propagation thence throughout the world. He himself was always the cardinal factor in this new era, but the time and place were essential conditions of the realization of this universal Buddhism.