  Because Nishida throughout his career cited Western philosophers far more often than Asian sources, it is easy to read his thought as an ongoing engagement with problems that have their origin in Western traditions.  In addressing the concerns of Western thinkers he followed the path taken by nearly all Japanese professors of philosophy since the inception of the academic discipline in the 1880s. Yet his appropriation of ideas from Asian philosophies is also evident to the discerning reader, if more by way of allusion and affinity than by direct citation. It was not always necessary for him to name his Asian sources as explicitly, for he could appeal to the general education of Japanese readers who would be familiar with the classics of Asia and with the convention of appropriating ideas without directly referring to them. While commentators have long pointed out the debt of Nishida to Zen Buddhist practice and thought, they have only recently begun to identify other Asian sources of his philosophy by researching his vast library in Asian languages (Dalissier 2009b).  In retrospect, it is clear that all along Nishida was infusing Western philosophy with Asian thought far more pervasively than the few references to Buddhism above might indicate.