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Brinton + +Release Date: September 22, 2009 [EBook #30061] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT *** + + + + +Produced by Julia Miller and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by The +Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + +Transcriber’s Note + +A number of typographical errors have been maintained in this version of +this book. They have been marked with a [TN-#], which refers to a +description in the complete list found at the end of the text. + +The following less common character is used. If it doesn't display +properly, please try changing your font. + + √ square root sign + + + + +_BY THE SAME AUTHOR._ + + THE MYTHS OF THE NEW WORLD: A Treatise on the Symbolism and Mythology + of the Red Race of America. _Second edition, revised._ Large 12mo, + $2.50. + + THE RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT: Its Source and Aim. A Contribution to the + Science and Philosophy of Religion. Large 12mo, $2.50. + + + + + THE + + RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT + + ITS SOURCE AND AIM + + _A CONTRIBUTION TO THE SCIENCE AND + PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION._ + + BY + + DANIEL G. BRINTON, A.M., M.D. + + _Member of the American Philosophical Society, the American Philological + Society, etc.; author of “The Myths of the New World,” etc._ + + [Colophon] + + NEW YORK + HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY + 1876. + + + + + COPYRIGHT, + BY HENRY HOLT + 1876. + + JOHN F. TROW & SON, PRINTERS, + 205-213 EAST 12TH ST., NEW YORK. + + + + +PREFACE + + +Mythology, since it began to receive a scientific handling at all, has +been treated as a subordinate branch of history or of ethnology. The +“science of religion,” as we know it in the works of Burnouf, Müller, +and others, is a comparison of systems of worship in their historic +development. The deeper inquiry as to what in the mind of man gave birth +to religion in any of its forms, what spirit breathed and is ever +breathing life into these dry bones, this, the final and highest +question of all, has had but passing or prejudiced attention. To its +investigation this book is devoted. + +The analysis of the religious sentiment I offer is an inductive one, +whose outlines were furnished by a preliminary study of the religions of +the native race of America, a field selected as most favorable by reason +of the simplicity of many of its cults, and the absence of theories +respecting them. This study was embodied in “The Myths of the New World; +a Treatise on the Symbolism and Mythology of the Red Race of America” +(second edition, N. Y. 1876). + +The results thus obtained I have in the present work expanded by +including in the survey the historic religions of the Old World, and +submitted the whole for solution to the Laws of Mind, regarded as +physiological elements of growth, and to the Laws of Thought, these, as +formal only, being held as nowise a development of those. This latter +position, which is not conceded by the reigning school of psychology, I +have taken pains to explain and defend as far as consistent with the +plan of this treatise; but I am well aware that to say all that can be +said in proof of it, would take much more space than here allowed. + +The main questions I have had before me in writing this volume have an +interest beyond those which mere science propounds. What led men to +imagine gods at all? What still prompts enlightened nations to worship? +Is prayer of any avail, or of none? Is faith the last ground of +adoration, or is reason? Is religion a transient phase of development, +or is it the chief end of man? What is its warrant of continuance? If it +overlive this day of crumbling theologies, whence will come its +reprieve? + +To such inquiries as these, answers satisfactory to thinking men of this +time can, I believe, be given only by an inductive study of religions, +supported by a sound psychology, and conducted in a spirit which +acknowledges as possibly rightful, the reverence which every system +claims. Those I propose, inadequate though they may be, can at any rate +pretend to be the result of honest labor. + +PHILADELPHIA, _January, 1876_. + + + + +CONTENTS. + + + PAGE. + CHAPTER I. + + THE BEARING OF THE LAWS OF MIND ON RELIGION 3 + + CHAPTER II. + + THE EMOTIONAL ELEMENTS OF THE RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT 47 + + CHAPTER III. + + THE RATIONAL POSTULATES OF THE RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT 87 + + CHAPTER IV. + + THE PRAYER AND ITS ANSWER 117 + + CHAPTER V. + + THE MYTH AND THE MYTHICAL CYCLES 155 + + CHAPTER VI. + + THE CULT, ITS SYMBOLS AND RITES 199 + + CHAPTER VII. + + THE MOMENTA OF RELIGIOUS THOUGHT 231 + + + + +THE BEARING OF THE LAWS OF MIND ON RELIGION + + +SUMMARY. + + The distinction between the Science and the Philosophy of religion. + It is assumed (1) that religions are products of thought, (2) that + they have a unity of kind and purpose. They can be studied by the + methods of natural science applied to Mind. + + Mind is co-extensive with organism. Sensation and Emotion are + prominent marks of it. These are either pleasurable or painful; the + latter _diminish_ vital motions, the former _increase_ them. This + is a product of natural selection. A mis-reading of these facts is + the fallacy of Buddhism and other pessimistic systems. Pleasure + comes from continuous action. This is illustrated by the esthetic + emotions, volition and consciousness. + + The climax of mind is Intellect. Physical changes accompany thought + but cannot measure it. Relations of thought and feeling. _Truth_ is + its only measure. Truth, like pleasure, is desired for its + preservative powers. It is reached through the laws of thought. + + These laws are: (1) the natural order of the association of ideas, + (2) the methods of applied logic, (3) the forms of correct + reasoning. The last allow of mathematical expression. They are + three in number, called those of Determination, Limitation and + Excluded Middle. + + The last is the key-stone of religious philosophy. Its diverse + interpretations. Its mathematical expres ion[TN-1] shows that it + does not relate to contradictories. But certain concrete analytic + propositions, relating to contraries, do have this form. The + contrary as distinguished from the privative. The Conditioned and + Unconditioned, the Knowable and Unknowable are not true + contradictions. The synthesis of contraries is theoretic only. + + Errors as to the limits of possible explanation corrected by these + distinctions. The formal law is the last and complete explanation. + The relations of thought, belief and being. + + + + +THE RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT. + + + + +CHAPTER I. + +THE BEARING OF THE LAWS OF MIND ON RELIGION. + + +The Science of Religion is one of the branches of general historical +science. It embraces, as the domain of its investigation, all recorded +facts relating to the displays of the Religious Sentiment. Its limits +are defined by those facts, and the legitimate inferences from them. Its +aim is to ascertain the constitutive laws of the origin and spread of +religions, and to depict the influence they have exerted on the general +life of mankind. + +The question whether a given religion is true or false cannot present +itself in this form as a proper subject of scientific inquiry. The most +that can be asked is, whether some one system is best suited to a +specified condition of the individual or the community. + +The higher inquiry is the object of the Philosophy of Religion. This +branch of study aims to pass beyond recorded facts and local adjustments +in order to weigh the theoretical claims of religions, and measure their +greater or less conformity with abstract truth. The formal or regulative +laws of religious thought occupy it. + +Theology, dogmatic or polemic, is an explanatory defence of some +particular faith. Together with mythology and symbolism, it furnishes +the material from which the Science and Philosophy of Religion seek to +educe the laws and frame the generalizations which will explain the +source and aim of religion in general. + +The common source of all devotional displays is the Religious Sentiment, +a complex feeling, a thorough understanding of which is an essential +preliminary to the study of religious systems. + +Such a study proceeds on the assumption that all religions are products +of thought, commenced and continued in accordance with the laws of the +human mind, and, therefore, comprehensible to the extent to which these +laws are known. No one disputes this, except in reference to his own +religion. This, he is apt to assert, had something “supernatural” about +its origin. If this word be correctly used, it may stand without cavil. +The “natural” is that of which we know in whole or in part the laws; the +“supernatural” means that of which we do not at present know in any +degree the laws. The domain of the supernatural diminishes in the ratio +of the increase of knowledge; and the inference that it also is +absolutely under the control of law, is not only allowable but +obligatory. + +A second assumption must be that there is a unity of kind and purpose in +all religions. Without this, no common law can exist for them. Such a +law must hold good in all ages, in every condition of society, and in +each instance. Hence those who explain religious systems as forms of +government, or as systems of ethics, or as misconceived history, or as +theories of natural philosophy, must be prepared to make their view good +when it is universally applied, or else renounce the possibility of a +Science of Religion; while those who would except their own system from +what they grant is the law of all others, violate the principles of +investigation and thereby the canons of truth. + +The methods of science are everywhere alike. Has the naturalist to +explain an organism, he begins with its elements or proximate principles +as obtained by analysis; he thence passes to the tissues and fluids +which compose its members; these he considers first in a state of +repose, their structure and their connections; then he examines their +functions, the laws of their growth and action; and finally he has +recourse to the doctrine of relations, _la théorie des milieux_, to +define the conditions of its existence. Were such a method applied to a +religion, it would lead us first to study its psychological elements, +then the various expressions in word and act to which these give +occasion, next the record of its growth and decay, and finally from +these to gather the circumstantials of human life and culture which led +to its historic existence. + +Some have urged that such a method should not be summoned to questions +in mental philosophy. To do so, say they, is to confound things +distinct, requiring distinct plans of study. Such a criticism might have +had weight in the days when the mind was supposed to inhabit the body as +a tenant a house, and have no relation to it other than that of a casual +occupant. But that opinion is antiquated. More than three-fourths of a +century ago the far-seeing thinker, Wilhelm von Humboldt, laid down the +maxim that the phenomena of mind and matter obey laws identical in +kind;[6-1] and a recent historian of science sums up the result of the +latest research in these words: + +“The old dualism of mind and body, which for centuries struggled in vain +for reconciliation, finds it now, not indeed in the unity of substance, +but in the unity of laws.”[6-2] + +It is, therefore, as a question in mental philosophy to be treated by +the methods of natural science, that I shall approach the discussion of +the religious sentiment. As it is a part, or at least a manifestation of +mind, I must preface its more particular consideration with some words +on the mind in general, words which I shall make as few and as clear as +possible. + +At the beginning of this century, the naturalist Oken hazarded the +assertion: “The human mind is a memberment of infusorial +sensation,”[7-1] a phrase which has been the guiding principle of +scientific psychology ever since. That in the course of this memberment +or growth wholly new faculties are acquired, is conceded. As the union +of two inorganic substances may yield a third different in every respect +from either; or, as in the transition of inorganic to organic matter, +the power of reproduction is attained; so, positively new powers may +attend the development of mind. From sensations it progresses to +emotions, from emotions to reason. The one is the psychical climax of +the other. “We have still to do with the one mind,whose[TN-2] action +developes itself with perception, through discrimination, till it +arrives at notions, wherein its most general scheme, ‘truth and error,’ +serves as the principle.”[8-1] + +Extravagant as Oken’s expression seemed to many when it was published, +it now falls short of the legitimate demands of science, and I may add, +of religion. _Mind is co-extensive with organism_; in the language of +logic, one “connotes” the other; this statement, and nothing short of +it, satisfies the conditions of the problem. Wherever we see Form +preserved amid the change of substance, _there_ is mind; it alone can +work that miracle; only it gives Life. Matter suffers no increase; +therefore the new is but a redistribution of the old; it is new in +_form_ only; and the maintenance of form under changes of substance is +the one distinguishing mark of organism. To it is added the yet more +wonderful power of transmitting form by reproduction. Wherever these +are, are also the rudiments of mind. The distinction between the animal +and the vegetable worlds, between the reasoning and unreasoning animals, +is one of degree only. Whether, in a somewhat different sense, we should +not go yet further, and say that mind is co-extensive with motion, and +hence with phenomena, is a speculative inquiry which may have to be +answered in the affirmative, but it does not concern us here. + +The first and most general mark of Mind is sensation or common feeling. +In technical language a sensation is defined to be the result of an +impression on an organism, producing some molecular change in its nerve +or life centres. It is the consequence of a contact with another +existence. Measured by its effects upon the individual the common law of +sensation is: Every impression, however slight, either adds to or takes +from the sum of the life-force of the system; in the former case it +produces a pleasurable, in the latter a painful sensation. The +exceptions to this rule, though many, are such in appearance only.[9-1] + +In the human race the impression can often be made quite as forcibly by +a thought as by an act. “I am confident,” says John Hunter, the +anatomist, “that I can fix my attention to any part, until I have a +sensation in that part.” This is what is called the influence of the +mind upon the body. Its extent is much greater than used to be imagined, +and it has been a fertile source of religious delusions. Such sensations +are called subjective; those produced by external force, objective. + +The immediate consequent of a sensation is _reflex action_, the object +of which is either to avoid pain or increase pleasure, in other words, +either to preserve or augment the individual life. + +The molecular changes incident to a sensation leave permanent traces, +which are the physical bases of memory. One or several such remembered +sensations, evoked by a present sensation, combine with it to form an +Emotion. Characteristic of their origin is it that the emotions fall +naturally into a dual classification, in which the one involves +pleasurable or elevating, the other painful or depressing conditions. +Thus we have the pairs joy and grief, hope and fear, love and hate, etc. + +The question of pleasure and pain is thus seen to be the primary one of +mental science. We must look to it to explain the meaning of sensation +as a common quality of organism. What is the significance of pleasure +and pain? + +The question involves that of Life. Not to stray into foreign topics, it +may broadly be said that as all change resolves itself into motion, +and, as Helmholtz remarks, all science merges itself into mechanics, we +should commence by asking what vital motions these sensations stand for +or correspond to. + +Every organism, and each of its parts, is the resultant of innumerable +motions, a composition of forces. As such, each obeys the first law of +motion, to wit, indefinite continuance of action until interfered with. +This is a modification of Newton’s “law of continuance,” which, with the +other primary laws of motion, must be taken as the foundation of biology +as well as of astronomy.[11-1] + +The diminution or dispersion of organic motion is expressed in +physiological terms as _waste_; we are admonished of waste by _pain_; +and thus admonished we supply the waste or avoid the injury as far as we +can. But this connection of pain with waste is not a necessary one, nor +is it the work of a _Providentia particularis_, as the schoolmen said. +It is a simple result of natural selection. Many organisms have been +born, no doubt, in which waste did not cause pain; caused, perhaps, +pleasure. Consequently, they indulged their preferences and soon +perished. Only those lived to propagate their kind in whom a different +sensation was associated with waste, and they transmitted this +sensitiveness increased by ancestral impression to their offspring. The +curses of the human race to-day are alcohol, opium and tobacco, and they +are so because they cause waste, but do not immediately produce painful +but rather pleasurable feelings. + +Pain, as the sensation of waste, is the precursor of death, of the part +or system. By parity of evolution, pleasure came to be the sensation of +continuance, of uninterrupted action, of increasing vigor and life. +Every action, however, is accompanied by waste, and hence every pleasure +developes pain. But it is all important to note that the latter is the +mental correlative not of the action but of its cessation, not of the +life of the part but of its ceasing to live. Pain, it is true, in +certain limits excites to action; but it is by awakening the +self-preservative tendencies, which are the real actors. This +physiological distinction, capable of illustration from sensitive +vegetable as well as the lowest animal organisms, has had an intimate +connection with religious theories. The problems of suffering and death +are precisely the ones which all religions set forth to solve in theory +and in practice. Their creeds and myths are based on what they make of +pain. The theory of Buddhism, which now has more followers than any +other faith, is founded on four axioms, which are called “the four +excellent truths.” The first and fundamental one is: “Pain is +inseparable from existence.” This is the principle of all pessimism, +ancient and modern. Schopenhauer, an out-and-out pessimist, lays down +the allied maxim, “All pleasure is negative, that is, it consists in +getting rid of a want or pain,”[13-1] a principle expressed before his +time in the saying “the highest pleasure is the relief from pain.” + +Consistently with this, Buddhism holds out as the ultimate of hope the +state of Nirvana, in which existence is not, where the soul is “blown +out” like the flame of a candle. + +But physiology demolishes the corner-stone of this edifice when it shows +that pain, so far from being inseparable from existence, has merely +become, through transmitted experience, nearly inseparable from the +progressive cessation of existence. While action and reaction are equal +in inorganic nature, the principle of life modifies the operation of +this universal law of force by bringing in _nutrition_, which, were it +complete, would antagonize reaction. In such a case, pleasure would be +continuous, pain null; action constant, reaction hypothetical. As, +however, nutrition in fact never wholly and at once replaces the +elements altered by vital action, both physicians and metaphysicians +have observed that pleasure is the fore-runner of pain, and has the +latter as its certain sequel.[14-1] + +Physiologically and practically, the definition of pleasure is, _maximum +action with minimum waste_. + +This latter generalization is the explanation of the esthetic emotions. +The modern theory of art rests not on a psychological but a +physiological, and this in turn on a physical basis. Helmholtz’s theory +of musical harmony depends on the experimental fact that a continued +impression gives a pleasant, a discontinuous an unpleasant sensation. +The mechanics of muscular structure prove that what are called graceful +motions are those which are the mechanical resultant of the force of +the muscle,--those which it can perform at least waste. The pleasure we +take in curves, especially “the line of beauty,” is because our eyes can +follow them with a minimum action of its muscles of attachment. The +popular figure called the Grecian figure or the walls of Troy, is +pleasant because each straight line is shorter, and at right angles to +the preceding one, thus giving the greatest possible change of action to +the muscles of the eye. + +Such a mechanical view of physiology presents other suggestions. The +laws of vibratory motion lead to the inference that action in accordance +with those laws gives maximum intensity and minimum waste. Hence the +pleasure the mind takes in harmonies of sound, of color and of odors. + +The correct physiological conception of the most perfect physical life +is that which will continue the longest in use, not that which can +display the greatest muscular force. The ideal is one of extension, not +of intension. + +Religious art indicates the gradual recognition of these principles. +True to their ideal of inaction, the Oriental nations represent their +gods as mighty in stature, with prominent muscles, but sitting or +reclining, often with closed eyes or folded hands, wrapped in robes, and +lost in meditation. The Greeks, on the other hand, portrayed their +deities of ordinary stature, naked, awake and erect, but the limbs +smooth and round, the muscular lines and the veins hardly visible, so +that in every attitude an indefinite sense of repose pervades the whole +figure. Movement without effort, action without waste, is the +immortality these incomparable works set forth. They are meant to teach +that the ideal life is one, not of painless ease, but of joyous action. + +The law of continuity to which I have alluded is not confined to simple +motions. It is a general mathematical law, that the longer anything +lasts the longer it is likely to last. If a die turns ace a dozen times +handrunning, the chances are large that it will turn ace again. The +Theory of Probabilities is founded upon this, and the value of +statistics is based on an allied principle. Every condition opposes +change through inertia. By this law, as the motion caused by a +pleasurable sensation excites by the physical laws of associated motions +the reminiscences of former pleasures and pains, a tendency to +permanence is acquired, which gives the physical basis for Volition. +Experience and memory are, therefore, necessary to volition, and +practically self restraint is secured by calling numerous past +sensations to mind, deterrent ones, “the pains which are indirect +pleasures,” or else pleasurable ones. The Will is an exhibition under +complex relations of the tendency to continuance which is expressed in +the first law of motion. Its normal action is the maintenance of the +individual life, the prolongation of the pleasurable sensations, the +support of the forces which combat death. + +Whatever the action, whether conscious or reflex, its real though often +indirect and unaccomplished object is the preservation or the +augmentation of the individual life. Such is the dictum of natural +science, and it coincides singularly with the famous maxim of Spinoza: +_Unaquaeque res, quantum in se est, in suo esse perseverare conatur._ + +The consciousness which accompanies volitional action is derived from +the common feeling which an organism has, as the result of all its parts +deriving their nutrition from the same centre. Rising into the sphere of +emotions, this at first muscular sensation becomes “self-feeling.” The +Individual is another name for the boundaries of reflex action. + +Through memory and consciousness we reach that function of the mind +called the intellect or reason, the product of which is _thought_. Its +physical accompaniments are chemical action, and an increase of +temperature in the brain. But the sum of the physical forces thus +evolved is not the measure of the results of intellectual action. These +differ from other forms of force in being incommensurate with extension. +They cannot be appraised in units of quantity, but in quality only. The +chemico-vital forces by which a thought rises into consciousness bear +not the slightest relation to the value of the thought itself. It is +here as in those ancient myths where an earthly maiden brings forth a +god. The power of the thought is dependent on another test than physical +force, to wit, its _truth_. This is measured by its conformity to the +laws of right reasoning, laws clearly ascertained, which are the common +basis of all science, and to which it is the special province of the +science of logic to give formal expression. + +Physical force itself, in whatever form it appears, is only known to us +as feeling or as thought; these alone we know to be real; all else is at +least less real.[18-1] Not only is this true of the external world, but +also of that assumed something, the reason, the soul, the ego, or the +intellect. For the sake of convenience these words may be used; but it +is well to know that this introduction of something that thinks, back +of thought itself, is a mere figure of speech. We say, “_I_ think,” as +if the “I” was something else than the thinking. At most, it is but the +relation of the thoughts. Pushed further, it becomes the limitation of +thought by sensation, the higher by the lower. The Cartesian maxim, +_cogito ergo sum_, has perpetuated this error, and the modern philosophy +of the _ego_ and _non-ego_ has prevented its detection. A false reading +of self-consciousness led to this assumption of “a thinking mind.” Our +personality is but the perception of the solidarity of our thoughts and +feelings; it is itself a thought. + +These three manifestations of mind--sensations, emotions and +thoughts--are mutually exclusive in their tendencies. The patient +forgets the fear of the result in the pain of the operation; in intense +thought the pulse falls, the senses do not respond, emotions and action +are absent. We may say that ideally the unimpeded exercise of the +intellect forbids either sensation or emotion. + +Contrasting sensation and emotion, on the one side, with intellect +on the other, feeling with thought, they are seen to be polar or +antithetical manifestations of mind. Each requires the other for its +existence, yet in such wise that the one is developed at the expense +of the other. The one waxes as the other wanes. This is seen to +advantage when their most similar elements are compared. Thus +consciousness in sensation is keenest when impressions are strongest; +but this consciousness is a bar to intellectual self-consciousness, +as was pointed out by Professor Ferrier in his general Law of +consciousness.[20-1] When emotion and sensation are at their minimum, +one is most conscious of the solidarity of one’s thoughts; and just in +proportion to the vividness of self-consciousness is thought lucid and +strong. In an ideal intelligence, self-consciousness would be +infinite, sensation infinitesimal. + +Yet there is a parallelism between feeling and thought, as well as a +contrast. As pain and pleasure indicate opposite tendencies in the +forces which guide sensation and emotion, so do the true and the untrue +direct thought, and bear the same relation to it. For as pain is the +warning of death, so the untrue is the detrimental, the destructive. The +man who reasons falsely, will act unwisely and run into danger thereby. +To know the truth is to be ready for the worst. Who reasons correctly +will live the longest. To love pleasure is not more in the grain of man +than to desire truth. “I have known many,” says St. Augustine, “who like +to deceive; to be deceived, none.” Pleasure, joy, truth, are the +respective measures of life in sensation, emotion, intellect; one or the +other of these every organism seeks with all its might, its choice +depending on which of these divisions of mind is prominently its own. As +the last mentioned is the climax, truth presents itself as in some way +the perfect expression of life. + +We have seen what pleasure is, but what is truth? The question of Pilate +remains, not indeed unanswered, but answered vaguely and +discrepantly.[21-1] We may pass it by as one of speculative interest +merely, and turn our attention to its practical paraphrase, what is +true? + +The rules of evidence as regards events are well known, and also the +principles of reaching the laws of phenomena by inductive methods. Many +say that the mind can go no further than this, that the truth thus +reached, if not the highest, is at least the highest for man. It is at +best relative, but it is real. The correctness of this statement may be +tested by analyzing the processes by which we acquire knowledge. + +Knowledge reaches the mind in two forms, for which there are in most +languages, though not in modern English, two distinct expressions, +_connaitre_ and _savoir_, _kennen_ and _wissen_. The former relates to +knowledge through sensation, the latter through intellection; the former +cannot be rendered in words, the latter can be; the former is reached +through immediate perception, the latter through logical processes. For +example: an odor is something we may certainly know and can identify, +but we cannot possibly describe it in words; justice on the other hand +may be clearly defined to our mind, but it is equally impossible to +translate it into sensation. Nevertheless, it is generally agreed that +the one of these processes is, so far as it goes, as conclusive as the +other, and that they proceed on essentially the same principles.[22-1] +Religious philosophy has to do only with the second form of knowledge, +that reached through notions or thoughts. + +The enchainment or sequence of thoughts in the mind is at first an +accidental one. They arise through the two general relations of nearness +in time or similarity in sensation. Their succession is prescribed by +these conditions, and without conscious effort cannot be changed. They +are notions about phenomena only, and hence are infinitely more likely +to be wrong than right. Of the innumerable associations of thought +possible, only one can yield the truth. The beneficial effects of this +one were felt, and thus by experience man slowly came to distinguish the +true as what is good for him, the untrue as what is injurious. + +After he had done this for a while, he attempted to find out some plan +in accordance with which he could so arrange his thoughts that they +should always produce this desirable result. He was thus led to +establish the rules for right reasoning, which are now familiarly known +as Logic. This science was long looked upon as a completed one, and at +the commencement of this century we find such a thinker as Coleridge +expressing an opinion that further development in it was not to be +expected. Since then it has, however, taken a fresh start, and by its +growth has laid the foundation for a system of metaphysics which will be +free from the vagaries and unrealities which have thrown general +discredit on the name of philosophy. + +In one direction, as applied logic and the logic of induction, the +natural associations of ideas have been thoroughly studied, and the +methods by which they can be controlled and reduced have been taught +with eminent success. In this branch, Bentham, Mill, Bain, and others +have been prominent workers. + +Dealing mainly with the subjects and materials of reasoning, with +thoughts rather than with thinking, these writers, with the tendency of +specialists, have not appreciated the labors of another school of +logicians, who have made the investigation of the process of thinking +itself their especial province. This is abstract logic, or pure logic, +sometimes called, inasmuch as it deals with forms only, “formal logic,” +or because it deals with names and not things, “the logic of names.” It +dates its rise as an independent science from the discovery of what is +known as “the quantification of the predicate,” claimed by Sir William +Hamilton. Of writers upon it may be mentioned Professor De Morgan, W. +Stanley Jevons, and especially Professor George Boole of Belfast. The +latter, one of the subtlest thinkers of this age, and eminent as a +mathematician, succeeded in making an ultimate analysis of the laws of +thinking, and in giving them a symbolic notation, by which not only the +truth of a simple proposition but the relative degree of truth in +complex propositions may be accurately estimated.[24-1] + +This he did by showing that the laws of correct thinking can be +expressed in algebraic notation, and, thus expressed, will be subject to +all the mathematical laws of an algebra whose symbols bear the uniform +value of unity or nought (1 or 0)--a limitation required by the fact +that pure logic deals in notions of quality only, not of quantity. + +This mathematical form of logic was foreseen by Kant when he declared +that all mathematical reasoning derives its validity from the logical +laws; but no one before Professor Boole had succeeded in reaching the +notation which subordinated these two divisions of abstract thought to +the same formal types. His labors have not yet borne fruit in proportion +to their value, and they are, I believe, comparatively little known. But +in the future they will be regarded as epochal in the science of mind. +They make us to see the same law governing mind and matter, thought and +extension. + +Not the least important result thus achieved was in emphasizing the +contrast between the natural laws of mental association, and the laws of +thinking which are the foundation of the syllogism. + +By attending to this distinction we are enabled to keep the form and the +matter of thought well apart--a neglect to do which, or rather a studied +attempt to ignore which, is the radical error of the logic devised by +Hegel, as I shall show more fully a little later. + +All applied logic, inductive as well as deductive, is based on formal +logic, and this in turn on the “laws of thought,” or rather of thinking. +These are strictly regulative or abstract, and differ altogether from +the natural laws of thought, such as those of similarity, contiguity and +harmony, as well as from the rules of applied logic, such as those of +agreement and difference. The fundamental laws of thinking are three in +number, and their bearing on all the higher questions of religious +philosophy is so immediate that their consideration becomes of the last +moment in such a study as this. They are called the laws of +Determination, Limitation and Excluded Middle. + +The first affirms that every object thought about must be conceived as +itself, and not as some other thing. “A is A,” or “_x_ = _x_,” is its +formal expression. This teaches us that whatever we think of, must be +thought as one or a unity. It is important, however, to note that this +does not mean a mathematical unit, but a logical one, that is, identity +and not contrast. So true is this that in mathematical logic the only +value which can satisfy the formula is a concept which does not admit of +increase, to wit, a Universal. + +From this necessity of conceiving a thought under unity has arisen the +interesting tendency, so frequently observable even in early times, to +speak of the universe as one whole, the το παν of the Greek philosophers; +and also the monotheistic leaning of all thinkers, no matter what their +creed, who have attained very general conceptions. Furthermore, the +strong liability of confounding this speculative or logical unity with +the concrete notion of individuality, or mathematical unity, has been, +as I shall show hereafter, a fruitful source of error in both religious +and metaphysical theories. Pure logic deals with quality only, not with +quantity. + +The second law is that of Limitation. As the first is sometimes called +that of Affirmation, so this is called that of Negation. It prescribes +that a thing is not that which it is not. Its formula is, “A is not +not-A.” If this seems trivial, it is because it is so familiar. + +These two laws are two aspects of the same law. The old maxim is, _omnis +determinatio est negatio_; a quality can rise into cognition only by +being limited by that which it is not. It is not a comparison of two +thoughts, however, nor does it limit the quality itself. For the +negative is not a thought, and the quality is not _in suo genere +finita_, to use an expression of the old logicians; it is limited not by +itself but by that which it is not. These are not idle distinctions, as +will soon appear. + +The third law comes into play when two thoughts are associated and +compared. There is qualitative identity, or there is not. A is either B +or not B. An animal is either a man or not a man. There is no middle +class between the two to which it can be assigned. Superficial truism as +this appears, we have now come upon the very battle ground of the +philosophies. This is the famous “Law of the contradictories and +excluded middle,” on the construction of which the whole fabric of +religious dogma, and I may add of the higher metaphysics, must depend. +“One of the principal retarding causes of philosophy,” remarks Professor +Ferrier, “has been the want of a clear and developed doctrine of the +contradictory.”[28-1] The want is as old as the days of Heraclitus of +Ephesus, and lent to his subtle paradoxes that obscurity which has not +yet been wholly removed. + +Founding his arguments on one construction of this law, expressed in the +maxim, “The conceivable lies between two contradictory extremes,” Sir +William Hamilton defended with his wide learning those theories of the +Conditioned and the Unconditioned, the Knowable and Unknowable, which +banish religion from the realm of reason and knowledge to that of faith, +and cleave an impassable chasm between the human and the divine +intelligence. From this unfavorable ground his orthodox followers, +Mansel and Mozley, defended with ability but poor success their +Christianity against Herbert Spencer and his disciples, who also +accepted the same theories, but followed them out to their legitimate +conclusion--a substantially atheistic one. + +Hamilton in this was himself but a follower of Kant, who brought this +law to support his celebrated “antinomies of the human understanding,” +warnings set up to all metaphysical explorers to keep off of holy +ground. + +On another construction of it, one which sought to escape the dilemma of +the contradictories by confining them to matters of the understanding, +Hegel and Schelling believed they had gained the open field. They taught +that in the highest domain of thought, there where it deals with +questions of pure reason, the unity and limits which must be observed in +matters of the understanding and which give validity to this third law, +do not obtain. This view has been closely criticized, and, I think, with +justice. Pretending to deal with matters of pure reason, it constantly +though surreptitiously proceeds on the methods of applied logic; its +conclusions are as fallacious logically as they are experimentally. The +laws of thought are formal, and are as binding in transcendental +subjects as in those which concern phenomena. + +The real bearing of this law can, it appears to me, best be derived from +a study of its mathematical expression. This is, according to the +notation of Professor Boole, _x_^{2}=_x_. As such, it presents a +fundamental equation of thought, and it is because it is of the second +degree that we classify in pairs or opposites. This equation can only be +satisfied by assigning to _x_ the value of 1 or 0. The “universal type +of form” is therefore _x_(1-_x_)=0. + +This algebraic notation shows that there is, not two, but only one +thought in the antithesis; that it is made up of a thought and its +expressed limit; and, therefore, that the so-called “law of +contradictories” does not concern contradictories at all, in pure logic. +This result was seen, though not clearly, by Dr. Thompson, who indicated +the proper relation of the members of the formula as a positive and a +privative. He, however, retained Hamilton’s doctrine that “privative +conceptions enter into and assist the higher processes of the reason in +all that it can know of the absolute and infinite;” that we must, “from +the seen realize an unseen world, not by extending to the latter the +properties of the former, but by assigning to it attributes entirely +opposite.”[31-1] + +The error that vitiates all such reasoning is the assumption that the +privative is an independent thought, that a thought and its limitation +are two thoughts; whereas they are but the two aspects of the one +thought, like two sides to the one disc, and the absurdity of speaking +of them as separate thoughts is as great as to speak of a curve seen +from its concavity as a different thing from the same curve regarded +from its convexity. The privative can help us nowhere and to nothing; +the positive only can assist our reasoning. + +This elevation of the privative into a contrary, or a contradictory, has +been the bane of metaphysical reasoning. From it has arisen the doctrine +of the synthesis of an affirmative and a negative into a higher +conception, reconciling them both. This is the maxim of the Hegelian +logic, which starts from the synthesis of Being and Not-being into the +Becoming, a very ancient doctrine, long since offered as an explanation +of certain phenomena, which I shall now touch upon. + +A thought and its privative alone--that is, a quality and its +negative--cannot lead to a more comprehensive thought. It is devoid of +relation and barren. In pure logic this is always the case, and must be +so. In concrete thought it may be otherwise. There are certain +propositions in which the negative is a reciprocal quality, quite as +positive as that which it is set over against. The members of such a +proposition are what are called “true contraries.” To whatever they +apply as qualities, they leave no middle ground. If a thing is not one +of them, it is the other. There is no third possibility. An object is +either red or not red; if not red, it may be one of many colors. But if +we say that all laws are either concrete or abstract, then we know that +a law not concrete has all the properties of one which is abstract. We +must examine, then, this third law of thought in its applied forms in +order to understand its correct use. + +It will be observed that there is an assumption of space or time in many +propositions having the form of the excluded middle. They are only true +under given conditions. “All gold is fusible or not,” means that some is +fusible at the time. If all gold be already fused, it does not hold +good. This distinction was noted by Kant in his discrimination between +_synthetic_ judgments, which assume other conditions; and _analytic_ +judgments, which look only at the members of the proposition. + +Only the latter satisfy the formal law, for the proposition must not +look outside of itself for its completion. Most analytic propositions +cannot extend our knowledge beyond their immediate statement. If A is +either B or not B, and it is shown not to be B, it is left uncertain +what A may be. The class of propositions referred to do more than this, +inasmuch as they present alternative conceptions, mutually exhaustive, +each the privative of the other. Of these two contraries, the one always +evokes the other; neither can be thought except in relation to the +other. They do not arise from the dichotomic process of classification, +but from the polar relations of things. Their relation is not in the +mind but in themselves, a real externality. The distinction between such +as spring from the former and the latter is the most important question +in philosophy. + +To illustrate by examples, we familiarly speak of heat and cold, and to +say a body is not hot is as much as to say it is cold. But every +physicist knows that cold is merely a diminution of heat, not a distinct +form of force. The absolute zero may be reached by the abstraction of +all heat, and then the cold cannot increase. So, life and death are not +true contraries, for the latter is not anything real but a mere +privative, a quantitative diminution of the former, growing less to an +absolute zero where it is wholly lost. + +Thus it is easy to see that the Unconditioned exists only as a part of +the idea of the Conditioned, the Unknowable as the foil of the Knowable; +and the erecting of these mere privatives, these negatives, these +shadows, into substances and realities, and then setting them up as +impassable barriers to human thought, is one of the worst pieces of work +that metaphysics has been guilty of. + +The like does not hold in true contrasts. Each of them has an existence +as a positive,and[TN-3] is never lost in a zero of the other. The one is +always thought in relation to the other. Examples of these are subject +and object, absolute and relative, mind and matter, person and +consciousness, time and space. When any one of these is thought, the +other is assumed. It is vain to attempt their separation. Thus those +philosophers who assert that all knowledge is relative, are forced to +maintain this assertion, to wit, All knowledge is relative, is +nevertheless absolute, and thus they falsify their own position. So +also, those others who say all mind is a property of matter, assume in +this sentence the reality of an idea apart from matter. Some have argued +that space and time can be conceived independently of each other; but +their experiments to show it do not bear repetition. + +All true contraries are universals. A universal concept is one of +“maximum extension,” as logicians say, that is, it is without limit. The +logical limitation of such a universal is not its negation, but its +contrary, which is itself also a universal. The synthesis of the two can +be in theory only, yet yields a real product. To illustrate this by a +geometrical example, a straight line produced indefinitely is, logically +considered, a universal. Its antithesis or true contrary is not a +crooked line, as might be supposed, but the straight line which runs at +right angles to it. Their synthesis is not the line which bisects their +angle but that formed by these contraries continually uniting, that is, +the arc of a circle, the genesis of which is theoretically the union of +two such lines. Again, time can only be measured by space, space by +time; they are true universals and contraries; their synthesis is +_motion_, a conception which requires them both and is completed by +them. Or again, the philosophical extremes of downright materialism and +idealism are each wholly true, yet but half the truth. The insoluble +enigmas that either meets in standing alone are kindred to those which +puzzled the old philosophers in the sophisms relating to motion, as, for +instance, that as a body cannot move where it is and still less where it +is not, therefore it cannot move at all. Motion must recognise both time +and space to be comprehensible. As a true contrary constantly implies +the existence of its opposite, we cannot take a step in right reasoning +without a full recognition of both. + +This relation of contraries to the higher conception which logically +must include them is one of the well-worn problems of the higher +metaphysics. + +The proper explanation would seem to be, as suggested above, that the +synthesis of contraries is capable of formal expression only, but not of +interpretation. In pursuing the search for their union we pass into a +realm of thought not unlike that of the mathematician when he deals with +hypothetical quantities, those which can only be expressed in symbols--, +√1 for example,--but uses them to good purpose in reaching +real results. The law does not fail, but its operations can no longer be +expressed under material images. They are symbolic and for speculative +thought alone, though pregnant with practical applications. + +As I have hinted, in all real contraries it is theoretically possible to +accept either the one or the other. As in mathematics, all motion can be +expressed either under formulas of initial motion (mechanics), or of +continuous motion (kinematics), or as all force can be expressed as +either static or as dynamic force; in either case the other form +assuming a merely hypothetical or negative position; so the logic of +quality is competent to represent all existence as ideal or as material, +all truth as absolute or all as relative, or even to express the +universe in formulæ of being or of not-being. This perhaps was what +Heraclitus meant when he propounded his dark saying: “All things are +_and_ are not.” He added that “All is not,” is truer than “All is.” +Previous to his day, Buddha Sakyamuni had said: “He who has risen to the +perception of the not-Being, to the Unconditioned, the Universal, his +path is difficult to understand, like the flight of birds in the +air.”[37-1] Perhaps even he learned his lore from some older song of the +Veda, one of which ends, “Thus have the sages, meditating in their +souls, explained away the fetters of being by the not-being.”[37-2] The +not-being, as alone free from space and time, impressed these sages as +the more real of the two, the only absolute. + +The error of assigning to the one universal a preponderance over the +other arose from the easy confusion of pure with applied thought. The +synthesis of contraries exists in the formal law alone, and this is +difficult to keep before the mind. In concrete displays they are forever +incommensurate. One seems to exclude the other. To see them correctly we +must there treat them as alternates. We may be competent, for instance, +to explain all phenomena of mind by organic processes; and equally +competent to explain all organism as effects of mind; but we must never +suppose an immediate identity of the two; this is only to be found in +the formal law common to both; still less should we deny the reality of +either. Each exhausts the universe; but at every step each presupposes +the other; their synthesis is life, a concept hopelessly puzzling unless +regarded in all its possible displays as made up of both. + +This indicates also the limits of explanation. By no means every man’s +reason knows when it has had enough. The less it is developed, the +further is it from such knowledge. This is plainly seen in children, who +often do not rest satisfied with a really satisfactory explanation. It +is of first importance to be able to recognize what is a good reason. + +I may first say what it is _not_. It is not a _cause_. This is nothing +more than a prior arrangement of the effect; the reason for an +occurrence is never assigned by showing its cause. Nor is it a +_caprice_, that is, motiveless volition, or will as a motor. In this +sense, the “will of God” is no good reason for an occurrence. Nor is it +_fate_, or physical necessity. This is denying there is any explanation +to give. + +The reason can only be satisfied with an aliment consubstantial with +itself. Nothing material like cause, nor anything incomprehensible like +caprice, meets its demands. Reason is allied to order, system and +purpose above all things. That which most completely answers to these +will alone satisfy its requirements. They are for an ideal of order. +Their complete satisfaction is obtained in universal types and measures, +pure abstractions, which are not and cannot be real. The _formal law_ is +the limit of explanation of phenomena, beyond which a sound intellect +will ask nothing. It fulfils all the requirements of reason, and leaves +nothing to be desired. + +Those philosophers, such as Herbert Spencer, who teach that there is +some incogitable “nature” of something which is the immanent “cause” of +phenomena, delude themselves with words. The history and the laws of a +phenomenon _are_ its nature, and there is no chimerical something beyond +them. They are exhaustive. They fully answer the question _why_, as well +as the question _how_.[39-1] + +For it is important to note that the word “law” is not here used in the +sense which Blackstone gives to it, a “rule of conduct;” nor yet in that +which science assigns to it, a “physical necessity.” Law in its highest +sense is the type or form, perceived by reason as that toward which +phenomena tend, but which they always fail to reach. It was shown by +Kant that all physical laws depend for their validity on logical laws. +These are not authoritative, like the former, but purposive only. But +their purpose is clear, to wit, the attainment of proportion, +consistency or truth. As this purpose is reached only in the abstract +form, this alone gives us the absolutely true in which reason can rest. + +In the concrete, matter shows the law in its efforts toward form, mind +in its struggle for the true. The former is guided by physical force, +and the extinction of the aberrant. The latter, in its highest +exhibition in a conscious intelligence, can alone guide itself by the +representation of law, by the sense of Duty. Such an intelligence has +both the faculty to see and the power to choose and appropriate to its +own behoof, and thus to build itself up out of those truths which are +“from everlasting unto everlasting.” + +A purely formal truth of this kind as something wholly apart from +phenomena, not in any way connected with the knowledge derived through +the senses, does not admit of doubt and can never be changed by future +conquests of the reasoning powers. We may rest upon it as something more +permanent than matter, greater than Nature. + +Such was the vision that inspired the noble lines of Wordsworth:-- + + “What are things eternal?--Powers depart, + Possessions vanish, and opinions change, + And passions hold a fluctuating seat; + But, by the storms of circumstance unshaken, + And subject neither to eclipse nor wane, + Duty exists; immutably survive + For our support, the measures and the forms + Which an abstract intelligence supplies; + Whose kingdom is where time and space are not.” + +There is no danger that we shall not know what is thus true when we see +it. The sane reason cannot reject it. “The true,” says Novalis, “is that +which we cannot help believing.” It is the _perceptio per solam +essentiam_ of Spinoza. It asks not faith nor yet testimony; it stands in +need of neither. + +Mathematical truth is of this nature. We cannot, if we try, believe +that twice two is five. Hence the unceasing effort of all science is to +give its results mathematical expression. Such truth so informs itself +with will that once received, it is never thereafter alienated; +obedience to it does not impair freedom. Necessity and servitude do not +arise from correct reasoning, but through the limitation of fallacies. +They have nothing to do with + + “Those transcendent truths + Of the pure intellect, that stand as laws + Even to Thy Being’s infinite majesty.” + +It is not derogatory, but on the contrary essential to the conception of +the Supreme Reason, the Divine Logos, to contemplate its will as in +accord and one with the forms of abstract truth. “The ‘will of God’” +says Spinoza, “is the refuge of ignorance; the true Will is the spirit +of right reasoning.” + +This identification of the forms of thought with the Absolute is almost +as old as philosophy itself. The objections to it have been that no +independent existence attaches to these forms; that they prescribe the +conditions of thought but are not thought itself, still less being; that +they hold good to thought as known to man’s reason, but perchance not to +thought in other intelligences; and, therefore, that even if through the +dialectical development of thought a consistent idea of the universe +were framed, that is, one wherein every fact was referred to its +appropriate law, still would remain the inquiry, Is this the last and +absolute truth? + +The principal points in these objections are that abstract thought does +not postulate being; and that possibly all intelligence is not one in +kind. To the former objection the most satisfactory, reply has been +offered by Professor J. F. Ferrier. He has shown that the conception of +object, even ideal object, implies the conception of self in the +subject; and upon this proposition which has been fully recognized even +by those who differ from him widely, he grounds the existence of Supreme +Thought as a logical unity. Those who would pursue this branch of the +subject further, I would refer to his singularly able work.[43-1] + +The latter consideration will come up in a later chapter. If it be shown +that all possible intelligence proceeds on the same laws as that of man, +and that the essence of this is activity, permanence, or +truth--synonymous terms--then the limitation of time ceases, and +existence not in time but without regard to time, is a necessary +consequence. Knowledge through intellection can alone reach a truth +independent of time; that through sensation is always relative, true +for the time only. The former cannot be expressed without the +implication of the conceptions of the universal and the eternal as +“dominant among the subjects of thought with which Logic is +concerned;”[44-1] and hence the relation which the intellect bears to +the absolute is a real and positive one. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[6-1] In his essay entitled, _Ueber den Geschlechtsunterschied und +dessen Einfluss auf die organische Natur_, first published in 1795. + +[6-2] “Der alte Dualismus von Geist und Körper, der Jahrhunderte +hindurch nach Versöhnung gerungen, findet diese heute nicht +zwar in der Einheit der Substanz, wohl aber in der Einheit des +Gesetzes.” Dr. Heinrich Boehmer, _Geschichte der Entwickelung der +Naturwissenschaftlichen Weltanschauung in Deutschland_, s. 201 (Gotha, +1872). + +[7-1] _Elements of Physio-Philosophy_, §3589. Eng. trans., London, 1847. + +[8-1] Von Feuchtersleben, _The Principles of Medical Psychology_, p. 130 +(Eng. trans., London, 1847). + +[9-1] “The fundamental property of organic structure is to seek what is +beneficial, and to shun what is hurtful to it.” Dr. Henry Maudsley, +_Body and Mind_, p. 22. + +“The most essential nature of a sentient being is to move _to_ pleasure +and _from_ pain.” A. Bain, _On the Study of Character_, p. 292 (London, +1861). + +“States of Pleasure are connected with an increase, states of Pain with +an abatement of some or all of the vital functions.” A. Bain, _Mind and +Body_, p. 59. + +“Affectus est confusa idea, quâ Mens majorem, vel minorem sui corporis, +vel alicujus ejus partis, existendi vim affirmat.” Spinoza, _Ethices_, +Lib. III. _ad finem_. + +[11-1] The extension of the mechanical laws of motion to organic motion +was, I believe, first carried out by Comte. His biological form of the +first law is as follows: “Tout état, statique ou dynamique, tend à +persister spontanément, sans aucune altération, en resistant aux +perturbations extérieures.” _Système de Politique Positive_, Tome iv. p. +178. The metaphysical ground of this law has, I think, been very well +shown by Schopenhauer to be in the Kantian principle that time is not a +force, nor a quality of matter, but a condition of perception, and hence +it can exert no physical influence. See Schopenhauer, _Parerga und +Paralipomena_, Bd. II, s. 37. + +[13-1] “Aller Genuss, seiner Natur nach, ist negativ, d. h., in +Befreiung von einer Noth oder Pein besteht.” _Parerga und Paralipomena._ +Bd. II, s. 482. + +[14-1] “No impression whatever is pleasant beyond the instant of its +realization; since, at that very instant, commences the change of +susceptibility, which suggests the desire for a change of impression or +for a renewal of that impression which is fading away.” Dr. J. P. +Catlow, _The Principles of Aesthetic Medicine_, p. 155 (London, 1867). + +“Dum re, quem appetamus fruimur, corpus ex ea fruitione novam acquirat +constitutionem, á quá aliter determinatur, et aliæ rerum imagines in eo +excitantur,” etc. Spinoza, _Ethices_, Pars III, Prop. lix. + +[18-1] “Feeling and thought are much more real than anything else; they +are the only things which we directly know to be real.”--John Stuart +Mill.--_Theism_, p. 202. How very remote external objects are from what +we take them to be, is constantly shown in physiological studies. As +Helmholtz remarks: “No kind and no degree of similarity exists between +the quality of a sensation, and the quality of the agent inducing it and +portrayed by it.”--_Lectures on Scientific Subjects_, p. 390. + +[20-1] _The Philosophy of Consciousness_, p. 72. + +[21-1] The Gospel of John (ch. xviii.) leaves the impression that Pilate +either did not wait for an answer but asked the question in contempt, as +Bacon understood, or else that waiting he received no answer. The Gospel +of Nicodemus, however, written according to Tischendorf in the second +century, probably from tradition, gives the rest of the conversation as +follows: “Pilate says to him: What is truth? Jesus says: Truth is from +heaven. Pilate says: Is not there truth upon earth? Jesus says to +Pilate: See how one who speaks truth is judged by those who have power +upon earth!” [ch. iii.] + +[22-1] The most acute recent discussion of this subject is by Helmholtz, +in his essay entitled, “_Recent Progress in the Theory of Vision_.” + +[24-1] George Boole, Professor of Mathematics in Queen’s College, Cork, +was born Nov. 2, 1815, died Dec. 8, 1864. He was the author of several +contributions to the higher mathematics, but his principal production is +entitled: _An Investigation into the Laws of Thought, on which are +founded the mathematical Theories of Logic and Probabilities_ [London, +1854.] Though the reputation he gained was so limited that one may seek +his name in vain in the _New American Cyclopedia_ [1875], or the +_Dictionnaire des Contemporains_ [1859], the few who can appreciate his +treatise place the very highest estimate upon it. Professor Todhunter, +in the preface to his _History of the Theory of Probabilities_, calls it +“a marvellous work,” and in similar language Professor W. Stanley Jevons +speaks of it as “one of the most marvellous and admirable pieces of +reasoning ever put together” (_Pure Logic_, p. 75). Professor Bain, who +gives a synopsis of it in his _Deductive Logic_, wholly misapprehends +the author’s purpose, and is unable to appraise justly his conclusions. + +[28-1] _The Institutes of Metaphysic_, p. 459, (2nd edition.) + +[31-1] _An Outline of the Necessary Laws of Thought_, p. 113 (New York, +1860). + +[37-1] _The Dhamapada_, verse 93. + +[37-2] Koppen, _Der Buddhismus_, s. 30. + +[39-1] Spencer in assuming an “unknowable universal causal agent and +source of things,” as “the nature of the power manifested in phenomena,” +and in calling this the idea common to both religion and “ideal +science,” fell far behind Comte, who expressed the immovable position, +not only of positive science but of all intelligence, in these words: +“Le véritable esprit positif consiste surtout à substituer toujours +l’étude des _lois_ invariables des phénomènes à celles de leurs _causes_ +proprement dites, premières ou finales, en un mot la determination du +_comment_ à celle du _pourquoi_.”--_Systèmede[TN-4] Politique Positive_, +i. p. 47. Compare Spencer’s Essay entitled, “Reasons for dissenting from +Comte.” The purposive law is the only final cause which reason allows. +Comte’s error lay in ignoring this class of laws. + +[43-1] _The Institutes of Metaphysic_, 2d Ed. See also Bain, _The +Emotions and the Will_, the closing note. + +[44-1] Boole, _Laws of Thought_, p. 401. + + + + +THE EMOTIONAL ELEMENTS OF THE RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT. + + +SUMMARY. + + The Religious Sentiment is made up of emotions and thoughts. The + emotions are historically first and most prominent. Of all + concerned, Fear is the most obvious. Hope is its correlate. Both + suppose Experience, and a desire to repeat or avoid it. Hence a + Wish is the source of both emotions, and the proximate element of + religion. The significance of desire as the postulate of + development. The influence of fear and hope. The conditions which + encourage them. + + The success of desire fails to gratify the religious sentiment. The + alternative left is eternal repose, or else action, unending yet + which aims at nothing beyond. The latter is reached through Love. + The result of love is _continuance_. Illustrations of this. Sexual + love and the venereal sense in religions. The hermaphrodite gods. + The virgin mother. Mohammed was the first to proclaim a deity above + sex. The conversion of sexual and religious emotion exemplified + from insane delusions. The element of fascination. The love of God. + Other emotional elements in religions. + + The religious wish defined to be one _whose fruition depends upon + unknown power_. To be religious, one must desire and be ignorant. + The unknown power is of religious interest only in so far as it is + believed to be in relation to men’s desires. In what sense + ignorance is the mother of devotion. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + +THE EMOTIONAL ELEMENTS OF THE RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT. + + +The discussion in the last chapter illustrated how closely pain and +pleasure, truth and error, and thought and its laws have been related to +the forms of religions, and their dogmatic expressions. The character of +the relatively and absolutely true was touched upon, and the latter, it +was indicated, if attainable at all by human intelligence, must be found +in the formal laws of that intelligence, those which constitute its +nature and essence, and in the conclusions which such a premise forces +upon the reason. The necessity of this preliminary inquiry arose from +the fact that every historical religion claims the monopoly of the +absolutely true, and such claims can be tested only when we have decided +as to whether there is such truth, and if there is, where it is to be +sought. Moreover, as religions arise from some mental demand, the +different manifestations of mind,--sensation, emotion and +intellect--must be recognized and understood. + +Passing now to a particular description of the Religious Sentiment, it +may roughly be defined to be the feeling which prompts to thoughts or +acts of worship. It is, as I have said, a complex product, made up of +emotions and ideas, developing with the growth of mind, wide-reaching in +its maturity, but meagre enough at the start. We need not expect to find +in its simplest phases that insight and tender feeling which we +attribute to the developed religious character. “The scent of the +blossom is not in the bulb.” Its early and ruder forms, however, will +best teach the mental elements which are at its root. + +The problem is, to find out why the primitive man figured to himself any +gods at all; what necessity of his nature or his condition led him so +universally to assume their existence, and seek their aid or their +mercy? The conditions of the solution are, that it hold good everywhere +and at all times; that it enable us to trace in every creed and cult the +same sentiments which first impelled man to seek a god and adore him. +Why is it that now and in remotest history, here and in the uttermost +regions, there is and always has been this that we call _religion_? +There must be some common reason, some universal peculiarity in man’s +mental formation which prompts, which forces him, him alone of animals, +and him without exception, to this discourse and observance of religion. +What this is, it is my present purpose to try to find out. + +In speaking of the development of mind through organism, it was seen +that the emotions precede the reason in point of time. This is daily +confirmed by observation. The child is vastly more emotional than the +man, the savage than his civilized neighbor. Castren, the Russian +traveller, describes the Tartars and Lapps as a most nervous folk. When +one shocks them with a sudden noise, they almost fall into convulsions. +Among the North American Indians, falsely called a phlegmatic race, +nervous diseases are epidemic to an almost unparalleled extent. Intense +thought, on the other hand, as I have before said, tends to lessen and +annul the emotions. Intellectual self-consciousness is adverse to them. + +But religion, we are everywhere told, is largely a matter of the +emotions. The pulpit constantly resounds with appeals to the feelings, +and not unfrequently with warnings against the intellect. “I acknowledge +myself,” says the pious non-juror, William Law, “a declared enemy to the +use of reason in religion;” and he often repeats his condemnation of +“the labor-learned professors of far-fetched book-riches.”[49-1] As the +eye is the organ of sight, says one whose thoughts on such matters equal +in depth those of Pascal, so the heart is the organ of religion.[49-2] +In popular physiology, the heart is the seat of the emotions as the +brain is that of intellect. It is appropriate, therefore, that we +commence our analysis of the religious sentiment with the emotions which +form such a prominent part of it. + +Now, whether we take the experience of an individual or the history of a +tribe, whether we have recourse to the opinions of religious teachers or +irreligious philosophers, we find them nigh unanimous that the emotion +which is the prime motor of religious thought is _fear_. I need not +depend upon the well-known line of Petronius Arbiter, + + Primus in orbe deos fecit timor; + +for there is plenty of less heterodox authority. The worthy Bishop Hall +says, “Seldom doth God seize upon the heart without a vehement +concussion going before. There must be some blustering and flashes of +the law. We cannot be too awful in our fear.”[50-1] Bunyan, in his +beautiful allegory of the religious life, lets Christian exclaim: “Had +even Obstinate himself felt what I have felt of the terrors of the yet +unseen, he would not thus lightly have given us the _back_.” The very +word for God in the Semitic tongues means “fear;”[50-2] Jacob swore to +Laban, “by Him whom Isaac feared;” and Moses warned his people that +“God is come, that his fear may be before your faces.” To _venerate_ is +from a Sanscrit root (_sêv_), to be afraid of. + +But it is needless to amass more evidence on this point. Few will +question that fear is the most prominent emotion at the awakening of the +religious sentiments. Let us rather proceed to inquire more minutely +what fear is. + +I remarked in the previous chapter that “the emotions fall naturally +into a dual classification, in which the one involves pleasurable or +elevating, the other painful or depressing conditions.” Fear comes of +course under the latter category, as it is essentially a painful and +depressing state of mind. But it corresponds with and implies the +presence of Hope, for he who has nothing to hope has nothing to +fear.[51-1] “There is no hope without fear, as there is no fear without +hope,” says Spinoza. “For he who is in fear has some doubt whether what +he fears will take place, and consequently hopes that it will not.” + +We can go a step further, and say that in the mental process the hope +must necessarily precede the fear. In the immediate moment of losing a +pleasurable sensation we hope and seek for its repetition. The mind, +untutored by experience, confidently looks for its return. The hope only +becomes dashed by fear when experience has been associated with +disappointment. Hence we must first look to enjoy a good before we can +be troubled by a fear that we shall not enjoy it; we must first lay a +plan before we can fear its failure. In modern Christianity hope, hope +of immortal happiness, is more conspicuous than fear; but that hope is +also based on the picture of a pleasant life made up from experience. + +Both hope and fear, therefore, have been correctly called secondary or +derived emotions, as they presuppose experience and belief, experience +of a pleasure akin to that which we hope, belief that we can attain such +a pleasure. “We do not hope first and enjoy afterwards, but we enjoy +first and hope afterwards.”[52-1] Having enjoyed, we seek to do so +again. A desire, in other words, must precede either Hope or Fear. They +are twin sisters, born of a Wish. + +Thus my analysis traces the real source of the religious sentiment, so +far as the emotions are concerned, to a Wish; and having arrived there, +I find myself anticipated by the words of one of the most reflective +minds of this century: “All religion rests on a mental want; we hope, +we fear, because we wish.”[53-1] And long before this conclusion was +reached by philosophers, it had been expressed in unconscious religious +thought in myths, in the Valkyria, the Wish-maidens, for instance, who +carried the decrees of Odin to earth. + +This is no mean origin, for a wish, a desire, conscious or unconscious, +in sensation only or in emotion as well, is the fundamental postulate of +every sort of development, of improvement, of any possible future, of +life of any kind, mental or physical. In its broadest meaning, science +and history endorse the exclamation of the unhappy Obermann: “_La perte +vraiment irréparable est celle des désirs._”[53-2] + +The sense of unrest, the ceaseless longing for something else, which is +the general source of all desires and wishes, is also the source of all +endeavor and of all progress. Physiologically, it is the effort of our +organization to adapt itself to the ever varying conditions which +surround it; intellectually, it is the struggle to arrive at truth; in +both, it is the effort to attain a fuller life. + +As stimuli to action, therefore, the commonest and strongest of all +emotions are Fear and Hope. They are the emotional correlates of +pleasure and pain, which rule the life of sensation. Their closer +consideration may well detain us awhile. + +In the early stages of religious life, whether in an individual or a +nation, the latter is half concealed. Fear is more demonstrative, and as +it is essentially destructive, its effects are more sudden and visible. +In its acuter forms, as Fright and Terror, it may blanch the hair in a +night, blight the mind and destroy the life of the individual. As Panic, +it is eminently epidemic, carrying crowds and armies before it; while in +the aggravated form of Despair it swallows up all other emotions and +prompts to self destruction. Its physiological effect is a direct +impairment of vitality. + +Hope is less intense and more lasting than fear. It stimulates the +system, elates with the confidence of control, strengthens with the +courage derived from a conviction of success, and bestows in advance the +imagined joy of possession. As Feuchtersleben happily expresses it: +“Hope preserves the principle of duration when other parts are +threatened with destruction, and is a manifestation of the innermost +psychical energy of Life.”[54-1] + +Both emotions powerfully prompt to action, and to that extent are +opposed to thought. Based on belief, they banish uncertainty, and +antagonize doubt and with it investigation. The religion in which they +enter as the principal factors will be one intolerant of opposition, +energetic in deed, and generally hostile to an unbiased pursuit of the +truth. + +Naturally those temperaments and those physical conditions which chiefly +foster these emotions will tend to religious systems in which they are +prominent. Let us see what some of these conditions are. + +It has always been noticed that impaired vitality predisposes to fear. +The sick and feeble are more timorous than the strong and well. Further +predisposing causes of the same nature are insufficient nourishment, +cold, gloom, malaria, advancing age and mental worry. For this reason +nearly invariably after a general financial collapse we witness a +religious “revival.” Age, full of care and fear, is thus prompted to +piety, willing, as La Rochefoucauld remarks, to do good by precept when +it can no longer do evil by example. The inhabitants of swampy, +fever-ridden districts are usually devout. The female sex, always the +weaker and often the worsted one in the struggle for existence, is when +free more religious than the male; but with them hope is more commonly +the incentive than fear. + +Although thus prominent and powerful, desire, so far as its fruition is +pleasure, has expressed but the lowest emotions of the religious +sentiment. Something more than this has always been asked by sensitively +religious minds. Success fails to bring the gratification it promises. +The wish granted, the mind turns from it in satiety. Not this, after +all, was what we sought. + +The acutest thinkers have felt this. Pascal in his _Pensées_ has such +expressions as these: “The present is never our aim. The future alone is +our object.” “Forever getting ready to be happy, it is certain we never +can be.” “’Tis the combat pleases us and not the victory. As soon as +that is achieved, we have had enough of the spectacle. So it is in play, +so it is in the search for truth. We never pursue objects, but we pursue +the pursuit of objects.” But no one has stated it more boldly than +Lessing when he wrote: “If God held in his right hand all truth, and in +his left the one unceasingly active desire for truth, although bound up +with the law that I should forever err, I should choose with humility +the left and say: ‘Give me this, Father. The pure truth is for thee +alone.’”[56-1] The pleasure seems to lie not in the booty but in the +battle, not in gaining the stakes but in playing the game, not in the +winning but in the wooing, not in the discovery of truth but in the +search for it. + +What is left for the wise, but to turn, as does the preacher, from this +delusion of living, where laughter is mad and pleasure is vain, and +praise the dead which are dead more than the living which are yet alive, +or to esteem as better than both he that hath never been? + +Such is the conclusion of many faiths. Wasted with combat, the mortal +longs for the rest prepared for the weary. Buddha taught the +extinguishment in Nirvana; the Brahman portrays the highest bliss as +_shanti_, complete and eternal repose; and that the same longing was +familiar to ancient Judaism, and has always been common to Christianity, +numerous evidences testify.[57-1] Few epitaphs are more common than +those which speak of the mortal resting _in pace, in quiete_. + +The supposition at the root of these longings is that action must bring +fatigue and pain, and though it bring pleasure too, it is bought too +dearly. True in fact, I have shown that this conflicts with the theory +of perfect life, even organic life. The highest form of life is the most +unceasing living; its functions ask for their completest well being +constant action, not satisfaction. That general feeling of health and +strength, that _sens de bien être_, which goes with the most perfect +physical life, is experienced only when all the organs are in complete +working order and doing full duty. They impart to the whole frame a +desire of motion. Hence the activity of the young and healthy as +contrasted with the inertness of the exhausted and aged. + +How is it possible to reconcile this ideal of life, still more the hope +of everlasting life, with the acknowledged vanity of desire? It is +accomplished through the medium of an emotion which more than any I have +touched upon reveals the character of the religious sentiment--Love. +This mighty but protean feeling I shall attempt to define on broader +principles than has hitherto been done. The vague and partial meanings +assigned it have led to sad confusion in the studies of religions. In +the language of feeling, love is a passion; but it does not spring from +feeling alone. It is far more fervid when it rises through intellect +than through sense. “Men have died from time to time, and worms have +eaten them, but not for love,” says the fair Rosalind; and though her +saying is not very true as to the love of sense, it is far less true as +to the love of intellect. The martyrs to science and religion, to +principles and faith, multiply a hundred-fold those to the garden god. +The spell of the idea is what + + “Turns ruin into laughter and death into dreaming.” + +Such love destroys the baser passion of sense, or transfigures it so +that we know it no longer. The idea-driven is callous to the +blandishments of beauty, for his is a love stronger than the love to +woman. The vestal, the virgin, the eunuch for the kingdom of heaven’s +sake are the exemplars of the love to God. + +What common trait so marks these warring products of mind, that we call +them by one name? In what is all love the same? The question is +pertinent, for the love of woman, the love of neighbor, the love of +country, the love of God, have made the positive side of most religions, +the burden of their teachings. The priests of Cotytto and Venus, Astarte +and Melitta, spoke but a more sensuous version of the sermon of the aged +apostle to the Ephesians,--shortest and best of all sermons--“Little +children, love one another.”[59-1] + +The earliest and most constant sign of reason is “working for a remote +object.”[59-2] Nearly everything we do is as a step to something beyond. +Forethought, conscious provision, is the measure of intelligence. But +there must be something which is the object, the aim, the end-in-view of +rational action, which is sought for itself alone, not as instrumental +to something else. Such an object, when recognized, inspires the +sentiment of love. It springs from the satisfaction of reason. + +This conclusion as to the nature of love has long been recognized by +thinkers. Richard Baxter defined it as “the volition of the end,” “the +motion of the soul that tendeth to the end,” and more minutely, “the +will’s volition of good apprehended by the understanding.”[60-1] In +similar language Bishop Butler explains it as “the resting in an object +as an end.”[60-2] Perhaps I can better these explanations by the phrase, +_Love is the mental impression of rational action whose end is in +itself_. + +Now this satisfaction is found only in one class of efforts, namely, +those whose result is continuity, persistence, in fine, _preservation_. +This may be toward the individual, self-love, whose object is the +continuance of personal existence; toward the other sex, where the +hidden aim is the perpetuation of the race; toward one’s fellows, where +the giving of pleasure and the prevention of pain mean the maintenance +of life; toward one’s country, as patriotism; and finally toward the +eternally true, which as alone the absolutely permanent and +preservative, inspires a love adequate and exhaustive of its conception, +casting out both hope and fear, the pangs of desire as well as the +satiety of fruition. + +In one or other of these forms love has at all times been the burden of +religion: the glad tidings it has always borne have been “love on +earth.” The Phœnix in Egyptian myth appeared yearly as newly risen, +but was ever the same bird, and bore the egg from which its _parent_ was +to have birth. So religions have assumed the guise in turn of self-love, +sex-love, love of country and love of humanity, cherishing in each the +germ of that highest love which alone is the parent of its last and only +perfect embodiment. + +Favorite of these forms was sex-love. “We find,” observes a recent +writer, “that all religions have engaged and concerned themselves with +the sexual passion. From the times of phallic worship through Romish +celibacy down to Mormonism, theology has linked itself with man’s +reproductive instincts.”[61-1] The remark is just, and is most +conspicuously correct in strongly emotional temperaments. “The +devotional feelings,” writes the Rev. Frederick Robertson in one of his +essays, “are often singularly allied to the animal nature; they conduct +the unconscious victim of feelings that appear divine into a state of +life at which the world stands aghast.” Fanaticism is always united with +either excessive lewdness or desperate asceticism. The physiological +performance of the generative function is sure to be attacked by +religious bigotry. + +So prominent is this feature that attempts have been made to explain +nearly all symbolism and mythology as types of the generative procedure +and the reproductive faculty of organism. Not only the pyramids and +sacred mountains, the obelisks of the Nile and the myths of light have +received this interpretation, but even such general symbols as the +spires of churches, the cross of Christendom and the crescent of +Islam.[62-1] + +Without falling into the error of supposing that any one meaning or +origin can be assigned such frequent symbols, we may acknowledge that +love, in its philosophical sense, is closely akin to the mystery of +every religion. That, on occasions, love of sex gained the mastery over +all other forms, is not to be doubted; but that at all times this was +so, is a narrow, erroneous view, not consistent with a knowledge of the +history of psychical development. + +Sex-love, as a sentiment, is a cultivated growth. All it is at first is +a rude satisfaction of the erethism. The wild tribes of California had +their pairing seasons when the sexes were in heat, “as regularly as the +deer, the elk and the antelope.”[63-1] In most tongues of the savages of +North America there are no tender words, as “dear,” “darling,” and the +like.[63-2] No desire of offspring led to their unions. The women had +few children, and their fathers paid them little attention. The family +instinct appears in conditions of higher culture, in Judea, Greece, Rome +and ancient Germany. Procreation instead of lust was there the aim of +marriage. To-day, mere sentiment is so much in the ascendant that both +these elements are often absent. There is warm affection without even +instinctive knowledge of the design of the bond assumed.[63-3] + +Those who would confine the promptings of the passion of reproduction as +it appears in man to its objects as shown in lower animals, know little +how this wondrous emotion has acted as man’s mentor as well as paraclete +in his long and toilsome conflict with the physical forces. + +The venereal sense is unlike the other special senses in that it is +general, as well as referable to special organs and nerves. In its +psychological action it “especially contributes to the development of +sympathies which connect man not only with his coevals, but with his +fellows of all preceding and succeeding generations as well. Upon it is +erected this vast superstructure of intellect, of social and moral +sentiment, of voluntary effort and endeavor.”[64-1] Of all the +properties of organized matter, that of transmitting form and life is +the most wonderful; and if we examine critically the physical basis of +the labors and hopes of mankind, if we ask what prompts its noblest and +holiest longings, we shall find them, in the vast majority of instances, +directly traceable to this power. No wonder then that religion, which we +have seen springs from man’s wants and wishes, very often bears the +distinct trace of their origin in his reproductive functions. The liens +of the family are justly deemed sacred, and are naturally associated +with whatever the mind considers holy. + +The duty of a citizen to become a father was a prominent feature in +many ancient religions. How much honor the sire of many sons had in Rome +and Palestine is familiar to all readers. No warrior, according to +German faith, could gain entrance to Valhalla unless he had begotten a +son. Thus the preservation of the species was placed under the immediate +guardianship of religion. + +Such considerations explain the close connection of sexual thoughts with +the most sacred mysteries of faith. In polytheisms, the divinities are +universally represented as male or female, virile and fecund. The +processes of nature were often held to be maintained through such +celestial nuptials. + +Yet stranger myths followed those of the loves of the gods. Religion, as +the sentiment of continuance, finding its highest expression in the +phenomenon of generation, had to reconcile this with the growing concept +of a divine unity. Each separate god was magnified in praises as +self-sufficient. Earth, or nature, or the season is one, yet brings +forth all. How embody this in concrete form? + +The startling refuge was had in the image of a deity at once of both +sexes. Such avowedly were Mithras, Janus, Melitta, Cybele, Aphrodite, +Agdistis; indeed nearly all the Syrian, Egyptian, and Italic gods, as +well as Brahma, and, in the esoteric doctrine of the Cabala, even +Jehovah, whose female aspect is represented by the “Shekinah.” To this +abnormal condition the learned have applied the adjectives epicene, +androgynous, hermaphrodite, arrenothele. In art it is represented by a +blending of the traits of both sexes. In the cult it was dramatically +set forth by the votaries assuming the attire of the other sex, and +dallying with both.[66-1] The phallic symbol superseded all others; and +in Cyprus, Babylonia and Phrygia, once in her life, at least, must every +woman submit to the embrace of a stranger. + +Such rites were not mere sensualities. The priests of these divinities +often voluntarily suffered emasculation. None but a eunuch could become +high priest of Cybele. Among the sixteen million worshippers of Siva, +whose symbol is the Lingam, impurity is far less prevalent than among +the sister sects of Hindoo religions.[66-2] To the Lingayets, the member +typifies abstractly the idea of life. Therefore they carve it on +sepulchres, or, like the ancient nations of Asia Minor, they lay clay +images of it on graves to intimate the hope of existence beyond the +tomb. + +This notion of a hermaphrodite deity is not “monstrous,” as it has been +called. There lies a deep meaning in it. The gods are spirits, beings +of another order, which the cultivated esthetic sense protests against +classing as of one or the other gender. Never can the ideal of beauty, +either physical or moral, be reached until the characteristics of sex +are lost in the concept of the purely human. In the noblest men of +history there has often been noted something feminine, a gentleness +which is not akin to weakness; and the women whose names are ornaments +to nations have displayed a calm greatness, not unwomanly but something +more than belongs to woman. Art acknowledges this. In the Vatican Apollo +we see masculine strength united with maidenly softness; and in the +traditional face and figure of Christ a still more striking example how +the devout mind conjoins the traits of both sexes to express the highest +possibility of the species. “Soaring above the struggle in which the +real is involved with its limitations, and free from the characteristics +of gender, the ideal of beauty as well as the ideal of humanity, alike +maintain a perfect sexual equilibrium.”[67-1] + +Another and more familiar expression of the religious emotion, akin to +the belief in double-sexed deities,--nay, in its physiological aspect +identical with it, as assuming sexual self-sufficiency, is the myth of +the Virgin-Mother. + +When Columbus first planted the cross on the shores of San Domingo, the +lay brother Roman Pane, whom he sent forth to convert the natives of +that island, found among them a story of a virgin Mamóna, whose son +Yocaúna, a hero and a god, was chief among divinities, and had in the +old times taught this simple people the arts of peace and guided them +through the islands.[68-1] When the missionaries penetrated to the +Iroquois, the Aztecs, the Mayas, and many other tribes, this same story +was told them with such startling likeness to one they came to tell, +that they felt certain either St. Thomas or Satan had got the start of +them in America. + +But had these pious men known as well as we do the gentile religions of +the Old World, they would have seasoned their admiration. Long before +Christianity was thought of, the myth of the Virgin-Mother of God was in +the faith of millions, as we have had abundantly shown us of late years +by certain expounders of Christian dogmas. + +How is this strange, impossible belief to be explained? Of what secret, +unconscious, psychological working was it the expression? Look at its +result. It is that wherever this doctrine is developed the _status +matrimonialis_ is held to be less pure, less truly religious, than the +_status virginitatis_. Such is the teaching to-day in Lhassa, in Rome; +so it was in Yucatan, where, too, there were nunneries filled with +spouses of God. I connect it with the general doctrine that chastity in +either sex is more agreeable to God than marriage, and this belief, I +think, very commonly arises at a certain stage of development of the +religious sentiment, when it unconsciously recognises the indisputable +fact that sex-love, whether in its form of love of woman, family, or +nation, is not what that sentiment craves. This is first shown by +rejecting the idea of sex-love in the birth of the god; then his priests +and priestesses refuse its allurements, and deny all its claims, those +of kindred, of country, of race, until the act of generation itself is +held unholy and the thought of sex a sin. By such forcible though rude +displays do they set forth their unconscious acknowledgment of that +eternal truth: “He that loveth son or daughter more than Me, is not +worthy of Me.” + +The significance of these words is not that there is an antagonism in +the forms of love. It is not that man should hate himself, as Pascal, +following the teachings of the Church, so ably argued; nor that the one +sex should be set over against the other in sterile abhorrence; nor yet +that love of country and of kindred is incompatible with that toward the +Supreme of thought; but it is that each of these lower, shallower, +evanescent forms of emotion is and must be lost in, subordinated to, +that highest form to which these words have reference. Reconciliation, +not abnegation, is what they mean. + +Even those religions which teach in its strictness the oneness of God +have rarely separated from his personality the attribute of sex. He is +the father, _pater et genitor_, of all beings. The monotheism which we +find in Greece and India generally took this form. The ancient Hebrews +emphasized the former, not the latter sense of the word, and thus +depriving it of its more distinctive characteristics of sex, prepared +the way for the teachings of Christianity, in which the Supreme Being +always appears with the attributes of the male, but disconnected from +the idea of generation. + +Singularly enough, the efforts to which this latent incongruity prompts, +even in persons speaking English, in which tongue the articles and +adjectives have no genders, point back to the errors of an earlier age. +A recent prayer by an eminent spiritualist commences:--“Oh Eternal +Spirit, our Father and our Mother!” The expression illustrates how +naturally arises the belief in a hermaphrodite god, when once sex is +associated with deity. + +Of all founders of religions, Mohammed first proclaimed a divinity +without relation to sex. One of his earliest suras reads: + + “He is God alone, + God the eternal. + He begetteth not, and is not begotten; + And there is none like unto him.” + +And elsewhere:-- + + “He hath no spouse, neither hath he any offspring.”[71-1] + +While he expressly acknowledged the divine conception of Jesus, he +denied the coarse and literal version of that doctrine in vogue among +the ignorant Christians around him. Enlightened christendom, to-day, +does not, I believe, differ from him on this point. + +Such sexual religions do not arise, as the theory has hitherto been, +from study and observation of the generative agencies in nature, but +from the identity of object between love in sense and love in intellect, +profane and sacred passion. The essence of each is _continuance_, +preservation; the origin of each is subjective, personal; but the former +has its root in sensation, the latter in reason. + +The sex-difference in organisms, the “abhorrence of self-fertilization” +which Mr. Darwin speaks of as so conspicuous and inexplicable a +phenomenon, is but one example of the sway of a law which as action and +reaction, thesis and antithesis, is common to both elementary motion and +thought. The fertile and profound fancy of Greece delighted to prefigure +this truth in significant symbols and myths. Love, Eros, is shown +carrying the globe, or wielding the club of Hercules; he is the unknown +spouse of Psyche, the soul; and from the primitive chaos he brings forth +the ordered world, the Kosmos. + +The intimate and strange relation between sensuality and religion, so +often commented upon and denied, again proven, and always +misinterpreted, thus receives a satisfactory explanation. Some singular +manifestations of it, of significance in religious history, are +presented by the records of insane delusions. They confirm what I have +above urged, that the association is not one derived from observation +through intellectual processes, but is a consequence of physiological +connections, of identity of aim in the distinct realms of thought and +emotion. + +That eminent writer on mental diseases, Schroeder van der Kolk, when +speaking of the forms of melancholy which arise from physical +conditions, remarks: “The patient who is melancholy from disorders of +the generative organs considers himself sinful. His depressed tone of +mind passes over into religious melancholy; ‘he is forsaken by God; he +is lost.’ All his afflictions have a religious color.” In a similar +strain, Feuchtersleben says: “In the female sex especially, the erotic +delusion, unknown to the patient herself, often assumes the color of the +religious.”[73-1] “The unaccomplished sexual designs of nature,” +observes a later author speaking of the effects of the single life, +“lead to brooding over supposed miseries which suggest devotion and +religious exercise as the nepenthe to soothe the morbid longings.”[73-2] + +Stimulate the religious sentiment and you arouse the passion of love, +which will be directed as the temperament and individual culture prompt. +Develope very prominently any one form of love, and by a native affinity +it will seize upon and consecrate to its own use whatever religious +aspirations the individual has. This is the general law of their +relation. + +All the lower forms of love point to one to which they are the gradual +ascent, both of the individual and on a grander scale of the race, to +wit, the love of God. This is the passion for the highest attainable +truth, a passion which, as duty, prompts to the strongest action and to +the utter sacrifice of all other longings. No speculative acquaintance +with propositions satisfies it, no egotistic construction of systems, +but the truth expressed in life, the truth as that which alone either +has or can give being and diuturnity, this is its food, for which it +thirsts with holy ardor. Here is the genuine esoteric gnosis, the sacred +secret, which the rude and selfish wishes of the savage, the sensual +rites of Babylon, “mother of harlots,” and the sublimely unselfish +dreams of a “religion of humanity,” have alike had in their hearts, but +had no capacity to interpret, no words to articulate. + +Related to this emotional phase of the religious sentiment is the +theurgic power of certain natural objects over some persons. The +biblical scholar Kitto confesses that the moon exerted a strange +influence on his mind, stirring his devotional nature, and he owns that +it would not have been hard for him to join the worshippers of the +goddess of the night. Wilhelm von Humboldt in one of his odes refers to +similar feelings excited in him by the gloom and murmur of groves. The +sacred poets and the religious arts generally acknowledge this +_fascination_, as it has been called, which certain phenomena have for +religious temperaments. + +The explanation which suggests itself is that of individual and +ancestral association. In the case of Kitto it was probably the latter. +His sensitively religious nature experienced in gazing at the moon an +impression inherited from some remote ancestor who had actually made it +the object of ardent worship. The study of the laws of inherited memory, +so successfully pursued of late by Professor Laycock, take away anything +eccentric about this explanation, though I scarcely expect it will be +received by one unacquainted with those laws. + +The emotional aspect of religion is not exhausted by the varieties of +fear and hope and love. Wonder, awe, admiration, the æsthetic emotions, +in fact all the active principles of man’s mental economy are at times +excited and directed by the thought of supernatural power. Some have +attempted to trace the religious sentiment exclusively to one or the +other of these. But they are all incidental and subsidiary emotions. + +Certain mental diseases, by abnormally stimulating the emotions, +predispose strongly to religious fervor. Epilepsy is one of these, and +in Swedenborg and Mohammed, both epileptics, we see distinguished +examples of religious mystics, who, no doubt honestly, accepted the +visions which accompanied their disease as revelations from another +world. Very many epileptics are subject to such delusions, and their +insanity is usually of a religious character. + +On the other hand, devotional excitement is apt to bring about mental +alienation. Every violent revival has left after it a small crop of +religious melancholies and lunatics. Competent authorities state that in +modern communities religious insanity is most frequent in those sects +who are given to emotional forms of religion, the Methodists and +Baptists for example; whereas it is least known among Roman Catholics, +where doubt and anxiety are at once allayed by an infallible referee, +and among the Quakers, where enthusiasm is discouraged and with whom the +restraint of emotion is a part of discipline.[76-1] Authoritative +assurance in many disturbed conditions of mind is sufficient to relieve +the mental tension and restore health. + +If, by what has been said, it is clear that the religious sentiment has +its origin in a wish, it is equally clear that not every wish is +concerned in it. The objects which a man can attain by his own unaided +efforts, are not those which he makes the subjects of his prayers; nor +are the periodic and regular occurrences in nature, how impressive they +may be, much thought of in devotional moods. The moment that an event is +recognized to be under fixed law, it is seen to be inappropriate to seek +by supplication to alter it. No devotee, acquainted with the theory of +the tides, would, like Canute the King, think of staying their waves +with words. Eclipses and comets, once matters of superstitious terror, +have been entirely shorn of this attribute by astronomical discovery. +Even real and tragic misfortunes, if believed to be such as flow from +fixed law, and especially if they can be predicted sometime before they +arrive, do not excite religious feeling. As Bishop Hall quaintly +observes, referring to a curious medieval superstition: “Crosses, after +the nature of the cockatrice, die if they be foreseen.” + +Only when the event suggests the direct action of _mind_, of some free +intelligence, is it possible for the religious sentiment to throw around +it the aureole of sanctity. Obviously when natural law was little known, +this included vastly more occurrences than civilized men now think of +holding to be of religious import. Hence the objective and material form +of religion is always fostered by ignorance, and this is the form which +prevails exclusively in uncultivated societies. + +The manifestations of motion which the child first notices, or which the +savage chiefly observes, relate to himself. They are associated with the +individuals around him who minister to his wants; the gratification of +these depend on the volitions of others. As he grows in strength he +learns to supply his own wants, and to make good his own volitions as +against those of his fellows. But he soon learns that many events occur +to thwart him, out of connection with any known individual, and these +of a dreadful nature, hurricanes and floods, hunger, sickness and death. +These pursue him everywhere, foiling his plans, and frustrating his +hopes. It is not the show of power, the manifestations of might, that he +cares for in these events, but that they touch _him_, that they spoil +_his_ projects, and render vain _his_ desires; _this_ forces him to cast +about for some means to protect himself against them. + +In accordance with the teaching of his experience, and true moreover to +the laws of mind, he refers them, collectively, to a mental source, to a +vague individuality. This loose, undefined conception of an unknown +volition or power forms the earliest notion of Deity. It is hardly +associated with personality, yet it is broadly separated from the human +and the known. In the languages of savage tribes, as I have elsewhere +remarked, “a word is usually found comprehending all manifestations of +the unseen world, yet conveying no sense of personal unity.”[78-1] + +By some means to guard against this undefined marplot to the +accomplishment of his wishes, is the object of his religion. Its +primitive forms are therefore defensive and conciliatory. The hopes of +the savage extend little beyond the reach of his own arm, and the tenor +of his prayers is that the gods be neuter. If they do not interfere he +can take care of himself. His religion is a sort of assurance of life. + +Not only the religion of the savage, but every religion is this and not +much but this. With nobler associations and purer conceptions of life, +the religious sentiment ever contains these same elements and depends +upon them for its vigor and growth. It everywhere springs from _a desire +whose fruition depends upon unknown power_. To give the religious wish a +definition in the technic of psychology, I define it as: _Expectant +Attention, directed toward an event not under known control, with a +concomitant idea of Cause or Power_. + +Three elements are embraced in this definition, a wish, an idea of +power, ignorance of the nature of that power. The first term prompts the +hope, the third suggests the fear, and the second creates the +personality, which we see set forth in every religious system. Without +these three, religion as dogma becomes impossible. + +If a man wishes for nothing, neither the continuance of present comforts +nor future blessings, why need he care for the gods? Who can hurt him, +so long as he stays in his frame of mind? He may well shake off all +religions and every fear, for he is stronger than God, and the universe +holds nothing worth his effort to get. This was the doctrine taught by +Buddha Sakyanuni, a philosopher opposed to every form of religion, but +who is the reputed founder of the most numerous sect now on the globe. +He sought to free the minds of his day from the burden of the Brahmanic +ritual, by cultivating a frame of mind beyond desire or admiration, and +hence beyond the need of a creed. + +The second element, the idea of power, is an intellectual abstraction. +Its character is fluctuating. At first it is most vague, corresponding +to what in its most general sense we term “the supernatural.” Later, it +is regarded under its various exhibitions as separable phenomena, as in +polytheisms, in which must be included trinitarian systems and the +dualistic doctrine of the Parsees. But among the Egyptians, Greeks and +Aztecs, as well as in the words of Zarathustra and in the theology of +Christianity, we frequently meet with the distinct recognition of the +fundamental unity of all power. At core, all religions have seeds of +monotheism. When we generalize the current concepts of motion or force +beyond individual displays and relative measures of quantity, we +recognize their qualitative identity, and appreciate the logical unity +under which we must give them abstract expression. This is the process, +often unconscious, which has carried most original thinkers to +monotheistic doctrines, no matter whence they started. + +The idea of power controlling the unknown would of itself have been of +no interest to man had he not assumed certain relations to exist between +him and it on the one hand, and it and things on the other. A +dispassionate inquiry disproves entirely the view maintained by various +modern writers, prominently by Bain, Spencer and Darwin, that the +contemplation of power or majesty in external nature prompts of itself +the religious sentiment, or could have been its historical origin. Such +a view overlooks the most essential because the personal factor of +religion--the wish. Far more correct are the words of David Hume, in the +last century, by which he closes his admirable _Natural History of +Religions_: “We may conclude, therefore, that in all nations the first +ideas of religion arose not from a contemplation of the works of nature, +but from a concern with regard to the events of life, and from the +incessant hopes and fears which actuate the human mind.” A century +before him Hobbes had written in his terse way: “The natural seed of +religion lies in these four things: the fear of spirits, ignorance of +secondary causes, the conciliation of those we fear, and the assumption +of accidents for omens.”[81-1] The sentiment of religion is in its +origin and nature purely personal and subjective. The aspect of power +would never have led man to worship, unless he had assumed certain +relations between the unseen author or authors of that power and +himself. What these assumptions were, I shall discuss in the next +chapter. + +Finally, as has so often been remarked in a flippant and contemptuous +way,[82-1] which the fact when rightly understood nowise justifies, +religion cannot exist without the aid of ignorance. It is really and +truly the mother of devotion. The sentiment of religious fear does not +apply to a _known_ power--to the movement of an opposing army, or the +action of gravity in an avalanche for example. The prayer which under +such circumstances is offered, is directed to an unknown intelligence, +supposed to control the visible forces. As science--which is the +knowledge of physical laws--extends, the object of prayer becomes more +and more intangible and remote. What we formerly feared, we learn to +govern. No one would pray God to avert the thunderbolt, if lightning +rods invariably protected houses. The Swiss clergy opposed the system of +insuring growing crops because it made their parishioners indifferent to +prayers for the harvest. With increasing knowledge and the security +which it brings, religious terror lessens, and the wants which excite +the sentiment of devotion diminish in number and change in character. + +This is apt to cast general discredit on religion. When we make the +discovery that so many events which excited religious apprehension in +the minds of our forefathers are governed by inflexible laws which we +know all about, we not only smile in pity at their superstitions, but +make the mental inference that the diminished emotion of this kind we +yet experience is equally groundless. If at the bottom of all displays +of power lies a physical necessity, our qualms are folly. Therefore, to +the pious soul which still finds the bulk of its religious aspirations +and experiences in the regions of the emotions and sensations, the +progress of science seems and really does threaten its cherished +convictions. The audacious mind of man robs the gods of power when he +can shield himself from their anger. The much-talked-of conflict between +religion and science is no fiction; it exists, and is bound to go on, +and religion will ever get the worst of it until it learns that the +wishes to which it is its proper place to minister are not those for +pleasure and prosperity, not for abundant harvests and seasonable +showers, not success in battle and public health, not preservation from +danger and safety on journeys, not much of anything that is spoken of +in litanies and books of devotion. + +Let a person who still clings to this form of religion imagine that +science had reached perfection in the arts of life; that by skilled +adaptations of machinery, accidents by sea and land were quite avoided; +that observation and experience had taught to foresee with certainty and +to protect effectively against all meteoric disturbances; that a +perfected government insured safety of person and property; that a +consummate agriculture rendered want and poverty unknown; that a +developed hygiene completely guarded against disease; and that a +painless extinction of life in advanced age could surely be calculated +upon; let him imagine this, and then ask himself what purpose religion +would subserve in such a state of things? For whatever would occupy it +then--if it could exist at all--should _alone_ occupy it now. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[49-1] _Address to the Clergy_, pp. 42, 43, 67, 106, etc. + +[49-2] E. von Hardenberg [Novalis], _Werke_, s. 364. + +[50-1] _Treatises Devotional and Practical_, p. 188. London, 1836. + +[50-2] In Aramaic _dachla_ means either a god or fear. The Arabic Allah +and the Hebrew Eloah are by some traced to a common root, signifying to +tremble, to show fear, though the more usual derivation is from one +meaning to be strong. + +[51-1] “Wen die Hoffnung, den hat auch die Furcht verlassen.” Arthur +Schopenhauer, _Parerga und Paralipomena_. Bd. ii. s. 474. + +[52-1] Alexander Bain, _On the Study of Character_, p. 128. See also his +remarks in his work, _The Emotions and the Will_, p. 84, and in his +notes to James Mill’s _Analysis of the Mind_, vol. i., pp. 124-125. + +[53-1] Wilhelm von Humboldt’s _Gesammelte Werke_, Bd. vii., s. 62. + +[53-2] De Senancourt, _Obermann_, Lettre xli. + +[54-1] _Elements of Medical Psychology_, p. 331. + +[56-1] Lessing’s _Gesammelte Werke_. B. ii. s. 443 (Leipzig, 1855). + +[57-1] See Exodus, xxiii. 12; Psalms, lv. 6; Isaiah, xxx. 15; Jeremiah, +vi. 16; Hebrews, v. 9. So St. Augustine: “et nos post opera nostra +sabbato vitæ eternæ requiescamus in te.” _Confessionum Lib._ xiii. cap. +36. + +[59-1] “Filioli, diligite alterutrum.” This is the “testamentum +Johannis,” as recorded from tradition by St. Jerome in his notes to the +Epistle to the Galatians. + +[59-2] Alexander Bain, _The Senses and the Intellect_, Chap. I. + +[60-1] _A Christian Directory._ Part I. Chap. III. + +[60-2] “The very nature of affection, the idea itself, necessarily +implies resting in its object as an end.” _Fifteen Sermons by Joseph +Butler, late Lord Bishop of Durham_, Preface, and p. 147 (London, 1841). + +[61-1] Dr. J. Milner Fothergill, _Journal of Mental Science_, Oct. 1874, +p. 198. + +[62-1] The most recent work on the topic is that of Messrs. Westropp and +Wake, _The Influence of the Phallic Idea on the Religions of Antiquity_, +London, 1874. + +[63-1] Schoolcraft’s _History and Statistics of the Indian Tribes_, Vol. +iv. p. 224. + +[63-2] Richardson, _Arctic Expedition_, p. 412. + +[63-3] Most physicians have occasion to notice the almost entire loss in +modern life of the instinctive knowledge of the sex relation. Sir James +Paget has lately treated of the subject in one of his _Clinical +Lectures_ (London, 1875). + +[64-1] Dr. J. P. Catlow, _Principles of Aesthetic Medicine_, p. 112. +This thoughtful though obscure writer has received little recognition +even in the circle of professional readers. + +[66-1] This is probably what was condemned in Deuteronomy xxii. 5, and +Romans, i. 26. + +[66-2] “The worship of Siva is too severe, too stern for the softer +emotions of love, and all his temples are quite free from any allusions +to it.”--Ferguson, _Tree and Serpent Worship_, p. 71. + +[67-1] W. von Humboldt, in his admirable essay _Ueber die Männliche und +Weibliche Form_ (_Werke, Bd. I._). Elsewhere he adds: “In der Natur des +Gœttlichen strebt alles der Reinheit und Vollkommenheit des +Gattungsbegriff entgegen.” + +[68-1] I have collected the Haitian myths, chiefly from the manuscript +_Historia Apologetica de las Indias Occidentales_ of Las Casas, in an +essay published in 1871, _The Arawack Language of Guiana in its +Linguistic and Ethnological Relations_. + +[71-1] _The Koran_, Suras,[TN-5] cxii., lxii., and especially xix. + +[73-1] _Elements of Medical Psychology_, p. 281. + +[73-2] J. Thompson Dickson, _The Science and Practice of Medicine in +relation to Mind_, p. 383 (New York, 1874). + +[76-1] Dr. Joseph Williams, _Insanity, its Causes, Prevention and Cure_, +pp. 68, 69; Dr. A. L. Wigan, _The Duality of the Mind_, p. 437. + +[78-1] _The Myths of the New World, a Treatise on the Symbolism and +Mythology of the Red Race of America_, p. 145. + +[81-1] _Leviathan, De Homine_, cap. xii. + +[82-1] For instance, of later writers from whom we might expect better +things, Arthur Schopenhauer. He says in his _Parerga_ (Bd. ii. s. 290): +“Ein gewisser Grad allgemeiner Unwissenheit ist die Bedingung aller +Religionen;” a correct remark, and equally correct of the pursuit of +science and philosophy. But the ignorance which is the condition of such +pursuit is not a part of science or philosophy, and no more is it of +religion. + + + + +THE RATIONAL POSTULATES OF THE RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT. + + +SUMMARY. + + Religion often considered merely an affair of the feelings. On the + contrary, it must assume at least three premises in reason, its + “rational postulates.” + + I. There is Order in things. + + The religious wish involves the idea of cause. This idea not + exhausted by uniformity of sequence, but by quantitative relation, + that is, Order as opposed to Chance. Both science and religion + assume order in things; but the latter includes the Will of God in + this order, while the former rejects it. + + II. This order is one of Intelligence. + + The order is assumed to be a comprehensible one, whether it be of + law wholly or of volition also. + + III. All Intelligence is one in kind. + + This postulate indispensable to religion, although it has been + attacked by religious as well as irreligious philosophers. Its + decision must rest on the absoluteness of the formal laws of + thought. The theory that these are products of natural selections + disproved by showing, (1) that they hold true throughout the + material universe, and (2) that they do not depend on it for their + verity. Reason sees beyond phenomena, but descries nothing alien to + itself. + + The formal laws of reason are purposive. They therefore afford a + presumption of a moral government of the Universe, and point to an + Intelligence fulfilling an end through the order in physical laws. + Such an assumption, common to all historic religions, is thus + justified by induction. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + +THE RATIONAL POSTULATES OF THE RELIGIOUS SENTIMENT. + + +In philosophical discussions of religion as well as in popular +exhortations upon it, too exclusive stress has been laid upon its +emotional elements. “It is,” says Professor Bain, “an affair of the +feelings.”[87-1] “The essence of religion,” observes John Stuart Mill, +“is the strong and earnest direction of the emotions and desires towards +an ideal object.” “It must be allowed,” says Dr. Mansel,[87-2] “that it +is not through reasoning that men obtain their first intimation of their +relation to a deity.” In writers and preachers of the semi-mystical +school, which embraces most of the ardent revivalists of the day, we +constantly hear the “feeling of dependence” quoted as the radical +element of religious thought.[87-3] In America Theodore Parker, and in +Germany Schleiermacher, were brilliant exponents of this doctrine. To +the latter the philosopher Hegel replied that if religion is a matter of +feeling, an affectionate dog is the best Christian. + +This answer was not flippant, but founded on the true and only worthy +conception of the religious sentiment. We have passed in review the +emotions which form a part of it, and recognize their power. But neither +these nor any other mere emotions, desires or feelings can explain even +the lowest religion. It depends for its existence on the essential +nature of reason. We cannot at all allow, as Dr. Mansel asks of us, that +man’s first intimations of Deity came in any other way than as one of +the ripest fruits of reason. Were such the case, we should certainly +find traces of them among brutes and idiots, which we do not. The slight +signs of religious actions thought to have been noticed by some in the +lower animals, by Sir John Lubbock in ants, and by Charles Darwin in +dogs, if authenticated, would vindicate for these species a much closer +mental kinship to man than we have yet supposed. + +If we dispassionately analyze any religion whatever, paying less +attention to what its professed teachers say it is, than to what the +mass of the votaries believe it to be, we shall see that every form of +adoration unconsciously assumes certain premises in reason, which give +impulse and character to its emotional and active manifestations. They +are its data or axioms, or, as I shall call them, its “rational +postulates.” They can, I believe, be reduced to three, but not to a +lesser number. + +Before the religious feeling acquires the distinctness of a notion and +urges to conscious action, it must assume at least these three +postulates, and without them it cannot rise into cognition. These, their +necessary character and their relations, I shall set forth in this +chapter. + +They are as follows:-- + + I. There is Order in things. + II. This order is one of Intelligence. + III. All Intelligence is one in kind. + +I. The conscious or unconscious purpose of the religious sentiment, as +I have shown in the last chapter, is the _fruition of a wish_, the +success of which depends upon unknown power. The votary asks help where +he cannot help himself. He expects it through an exertion of power, +through an efficient cause. Obviously therefore, he is acting on the +logical idea of Causality. This underlies and is essential to the +simplest prayer. He extends it, moreover, out of the limits of +experience into the regions of hypothesis. He has carried the analogy +of observation into the realm of abstract conceptions. No matter if he +does believe that the will of God is the efficient cause. Perhaps he is +right; at any rate he cannot be denied the privilege of regarding +volition as a co-operating cause. Limited at first to the transactions +which most concerned men, the conception of order as a divine act +extended itself to the known universe. Herodotus derives the Greek word +for God θεος from a root which gives the meaning “to set in order,” and +the Scandinavians gave the same sense to their word, _Regin_.[90-1] +Thus the abstract idea of cause or power is a postulate of all +religious thought. Let us examine its meaning. + +Every reader, the least versed in the history of speculative thought for +the last hundred years, knows how long and violent the discussions have +been of the relations of “cause and effect.” Startled by the criticisms +of Hume, Kant sought to elude them by distinguishing between two spheres +of thought, the understanding and the reason. Sir William Hamilton at +first included the “principle of sufficient reason’[TN-6] in the laws of +thought, but subsequently rejected it as pertaining to judgments, and +therefore material, not formal. Schopenhauer claimed to have traced it +to a fourfold root, and Mill with most of the current English schools, +Bain, Austin, Spencer, &c., maintained that it meant nothing but +“uniformity of sequence.” + +It would be vain to touch upon a discussion so extended as this. In the +first chapter I have remarked that the idea of cause does not enter into +the conceptions of pure logic or thought. It is, as Hamilton saw, +material. I shall only pause to show what is meant by the term “cause” +in the physical sciences. When one event follows another, time after +time, we have “uniformity of sequence.” Suppose the constitution of the +race were so happy that we slept at night only, and always awoke a few +moments before sunrise. Such a sequence quite without exception, should, +if uniform experience is the source of the idea of cause, justly lead to +the opinion that the sun rises because man awakes. As we know this +conclusion would be erroneous, some other element beside sequence must +complete a real cause. If now, it were shown that the relation of cause +to effect which we actually entertain and cannot help entertaining is in +some instances flatly contrary to all experience, then we must +acknowledge that the idea of cause asks to confirm it something quite +independent of experience, that is abstract. But such examples are +common. We never saw two objects continue to approach without meeting; +but we are constrained to believe that lines of certain descriptions can +forever approach and never meet. + +The uniformity of sequence is, in fact, in the physical sciences never +assumed to express the relation of cause and effect, until the +connection between the antecedent and consequent can be set forth +abstractly in mathematical formulæ. The sequence of the planetary +motions was discovered by Kepler, but it was reserved for Newton to +prove the theoretical necessity of this motion and establish its +mathematical relations. The sequence of sensations to impressions is +well known, but the law of the sequence remains the desideratum in +psychology.[92-1] + +Science, therefore, has been correctly defined as “the knowledge of +system.” Its aim is to ascertain the laws of phenomena, to define the +“order in things.” Its fundamental postulate is that order exists, that +all things are “lapped in universal law.” It acknowledges no exception, +and it considers that all law is capable of final expression in +quantity, in mathematical symbols. It is the manifest of reason, “whose +unceasing endeavor is to banish the idea of Chance.”[93-1] + +We thus see that its postulate is the same as that of the religious +sentiment. Wherein then do they differ? Not in the recognition of +chance. Accident, chance, does not exist for the religious sense in any +stage of its growth. Everywhere religion proclaims in the words of +Dante:-- + + “le cose tutte quante, + Hann’ ordine tra loro;” + +everywhere in the more optimistic faiths it holds this order, in the +words of St. Augustine, to be one “most fair, of excellent +things.”[93-2] + +What we call “the element of chance” is in its scientific sense that of +which we do not know the law; while to the untutored religious mind it +is the manifestation of divine will. The Kamschatkan, when his boat is +lost in the storm, attributes it to the vengeance of a god angered +because he scraped the snow from his shoes with a knife, instead of +using a piece of wood; if a Dakota has bad luck in hunting, he says it +is caused by his wife stepping over a bone and thus irritating a +spirit. The idea of cause, the sentiment of order, is as strong as ever, +but it differs from that admitted by science in recognizing as a +possible efficient motor that which is incapable of mathematical +expression, namely, a volition, a will. _Voluntas Dei asylum +ignorantiæ_, is no unkind description of such an opinion. + +So long as this recognition is essential to the life of a religious +system, just so long it will and must be in conflict with science, with +every prospect of the latter gaining the victory. Is the belief in +volition as an efficient cause indispensable to the religious sentiment +in general? For this vital question we are not yet prepared, but must +first consider the remaining rational postulates it assumes. The second +is + +II. This order is one of intelligence. + +By this is not meant that the order is one of _an_ Intelligence, but +simply that the order which exists in things is conformable to man’s +thinking power,--that if he knows the course of events he can appreciate +their relations,--that facts can be subsumed under thoughts. Whatever +scheme of order there were, would be nothing to him unless it were +conformable to his intellectual functions. It could not form the matter +of his thought.[94-1] + +Science, which deals in the first instance exclusively with phenomena, +also assumes this postulate. It recognizes that when the formal laws, +which it is its mission to define, are examined apart from their +material expression, when they are emptied of their phenomenal contents, +they show themselves to be logical constructions, reasoned truths, in +other words, forms of intelligence. The votary who assumes the order one +of volition alone, or volition with physical necessity, still assumes +the volitions are as comprehensible as are his own; that they are +purposive; that the order, even if not clear to him, is both real and +reasonable. Were it not so, did he believe that the gods carried out +their schemes through a series of caprices inconceivable to +intelligence, through absolute chance, insane caprice, or blind fate, he +could neither see in occurrences the signs of divine rule, nor hope for +aid in obtaining his wishes. In fact, order is only conceivable to man +at all as an order conformable to his own intelligence. + +This second postulate embraces what has been recently called the +“Principle of continuity,” indispensable to sane thought of any kind. A +late work defines it as “the trust that the Supreme Governor of the +Universe will not put us to permanent intellectual confusion.”[96-1] +Looked at closely, it is the identification of order with reason. + +The third and final postulate of the religious sentiment is that + +III. All intelligence is one in kind. + +Religion demands that there be a truth which is absolutely true, and +that there be a goodness which is universally and eternally good. Each +system claims the possession, and generally the exclusive possession, +of this goodness and truth. They are right in maintaining these views, +for unless such is the case, unless there is an absolute truth, +cognizable to man, yet not transcended by any divine intelligence, all +possible religion becomes mere child’s play, and its professed +interpretation of mysteries but trickery. + +The Grecian sophists used to meet the demonstrations of the +mathematicians and philosophers by conceding that they did indeed set +forth the truth, so far as man’s intelligence goes, but that to the +intelligence of other beings--a bat or an angel, for example--they might +not hold good at all; that there is a different truth for different +intelligences; that the intelligence makes the truth; and that as for +the absolutely true, true to every intelligence, there is no such thing. +They acknowledged that a simple syllogism, constructed on these +premises, made their own assertions partake of the doubtful character +that was by them ascribed to other human knowledge. But this they +gracefully accepted as the inevitable conclusion of reasoning. Their +position is defended to-day by the advocates of “positivism,” who +maintain the relativity of all truth. + +But such a conclusion is wholly incompatible with the religious mind. It +must assume that there are some common truths, true infinitely, and +therefore, that in all intelligence there is an essential unity of kind. +“This postulation,” says a close thinker, “is the very foundation and +essence of religion. Destroy it, and you destroy the very possibility of +religion.”[97-1] + +Clear as this would seem to be to any reflective mind, yet, strange to +say, it is to-day the current fashion for religious teachers to deny it. +Scared by a phantasm of their own creation, they have deserted the only +position in which it is possible to defend religion at all. Afraid of +the accusation that they make God like man, they have removed Him +beyond the pale of all intelligence, and logically, therefore, +annihilated every conception of Him. + +Teachers and preachers do not tire of telling their followers that God +is incomprehensible; that his ways are past finding out; that he is the +Unconditioned, the Infinite, the Unknowable. They really mean that he is +another order of intelligence, which, to quote a famous comparison of +Spinoza, has the same name as ours, but is no more one with it than the +dog is one with his namesake, the dog-star! + +They are eagerly seconded in this position by a school of writers who +distinctly see where such a doctrine leads, and who do not hesitate to +carry it home. Mr. Mill is right in his scorn for those who “erect the +incurable limitations of the human conceptive faculty into laws of the +outward universe,” if there are such limitations. And Mr. Spencer is +justified in condemning “the transcendent audacity which passes current +as piety,” if his definition of the underlying verity of religion is +admitted--that it is “the consciousness of an inscrutable power which, +in its nature, transcends intuition, and is beyond imagination.”[98-1] +They are but following the orthodox Sir William Hamilton, who says: +“Creation must be thought as the incomprehensible evolution of power +into energy.”[99-1] We are to think that which by the terms of the +proposition is unthinkable! A most wise master! + +Let it be noted that the expressions such as inscrutable, +incomprehensible, unknowable, etc., which such writers use, are avowedly +not limited to man’s intelligence in its present state of cultivation, +but are applied to his _kind_ of intelligence, no matter how far +trained. They mean that the inscrutable, etc., is not merely not _at +present_ open to man’s observation--that were a truism--but that it +cannot be subsumed under the laws of his reasoning powers. In other +words, they deny that all intelligence is one in _kind_. Some accept +this fully, and concede that what are called the laws of order, as shown +by science, are only matters of experience, true here and now, not +necessarily and absolutely true. + +This is a consistent inference, and applies, of course, with equal force +to all moral laws and religious dogmas. + +The arguments brought against such opinions have been various. The old +reply to the sophists has been dressed in modern garb, and it has been +repeatedly put that if no statement is really true, then this one, to +wit “no statement is really true,” also is not true; and if that is the +case, then there are statements which really are true. The theory of +evolution as a dogma has been attacked by its own maxims; in asserting +that all knowledge is imperfect, it calls its own verity into question. +If all truth is relative, then this at least is absolutely true. + +It has also been noted that all such words as incomprehensible, +unconditioned, infinite, unknowable, are in their nature privatives, +they are not a thought but are only one element of a thought. As has +been shown in the first chapter, every thought is made up of a positive +and a privative, and it is absurd and unnatural to separate the one from +the other. The concept man, regarded as a division of the higher concept +animal, is made up of man and not-man. In so far as other animals are +included under the term “not-man” they do not come into intelligent +cognition; but that does not mean that they cannot do so. So “the +unconditioned” is really a part of the thought of “the conditioned,” the +“unknowable” a part of the “knowable,” the “infinite” a part of the +thought of the “finite.” Under material images these privatives, as +such, cannot be expressed; but in pure thought which deals with symbols +and types alone, they can be. + +But if the abstract laws of thought themselves are confined in the +limits of one kind of intelligence, then we cannot take an appeal to +them to attack this sophism. Therefore on maintaining their integrity +the discussion must finally rest. This has been fully recognized by +thinkers, one of whom has not long since earnestly called attention to +“the urgent necessity of fathoming the psychical mechanism on which +rests all our intellectual life.”[101-1] + +In this endeavor the attempt has been made to show that the logical laws +are derived in accordance with the general theory of evolution from the +natural or material laws of thinking. These, as I have previously +remarked, are those of the association of ideas, and come under the +general heads of contiguity and similarity. Such combinations are +independent of the aim of the logical laws, which is _correct_ thinking. +A German writer, Dr. Windelband, has therefore argued that as +experience, strengthened by hereditary transmission, continued to show +that the particular combinations which are in accord with what we call +the laws of thought furnished the best, that is, the most useful +results, they were adopted in preference to others and finally assumed +as the criteria of truth. + +Of course it follows from this that as these laws are merely the outcome +of human experience they can have no validity outside of it. +Consequently, adds the writer I have quoted, just as the study of optics +teaches us that the human eye yields a very different picture of the +external world from that given by the eye of a fly, for instance, and +as each of them is equally far from the reality, so the truth which our +intelligence enables us to reach is not less remote from that which is +the absolutely true. He considers that this is proven by the very nature +of the “law of contradiction” itself, which must be inconsistent with +the character of absolute thought. For in the latter, positive truth +only can exist, therefore no negation, and no law about the relation of +affirmative to negative.[102-1] + +The latter criticism assumes that negation is of the nature of error, a +mistake drawn from the use of the negative in applied logic. For in +formal logic, whether as quantity or quality, that is, in pure +mathematics or abstract thought, the reasoning is just as correct when +negatives are employed as when positives, as I have remarked before. The +other criticism is more important, for if we can reach the conclusion +that the real laws of the universe are other than as we understand them, +then our intelligence is not of a kind to represent them. + +Such an opinion can be refuted directly. The laws which we profess to +know are as operative in the remotest nebulae as in the planet we +inhabit. It is altogether likely that countless forms of intelligent +beings inhabit the starry wastes, receiving through sensory apparatus +widely different from ours very diverse impressions of the external +world. All this we know, but we also know that if those beings have +defined the laws which underlie phenomena, they have found them to be +the same that we have; for were they in the least different, in +principle or application, they could not furnish the means, as those we +know do, of predicting the recurrence of the celestial motions with +unfailing accuracy. Therefore the demonstrations of pure mathematics, +such as the relation of an absciss to an ordinate, or of the diameter to +the circumference, must be universally true; and hence the logical laws +which are the ultimate criteria of these truths must also be true to +every intelligence, real or possible.[103-1] + +Another and forcible reply to these objections is that the laws which +our intelligence has reached and recognizes as universally true are not +only not derived from experience, but are in direct opposition to and +are constantly contradicted by it. Neither sense nor imagination has +ever portrayed a perfect circle in which the diameter bore to the +circumference the exact proportion which we know it does bear. The very +fact that we have learned that our senses are wholly untrustworthy, and +that experience is always fallacious, shows that we have tests of truth +depending on some other faculty. “Each series of connected facts in +nature furnishes the intimation of an order more exact than that which +it directly manifests.”[104-1] + +But, it has been urged, granted that we have reached something like +positive knowledge of those laws which are the _order_ of the +manifestation of phenomena, the real Inscrutable, the mysterious +Unknowable, escapes us still; this is the _nature_ of phenomenal +manifestation, “the secret of the Power manifested in Existence.”[104-2] +At this point the physicist trips and falls; and here, too, the +metaphysician stumbles. + +I have already spoken of our aptitude to be frightened by a chimera, and +deceived by such words as “nature” and “cause.” Laws and rules, by which +we express Order, are restrictive only in a condition of intelligence +short of completeness, only therefore in that province of thought which +concerns itself with material facts. The musician is not fettered by the +laws of harmony, but only by those of discord. The truly virtuous man, +remarks Aristotle, never has occasion to practise self-denial. Hence, +mathematically, “the theory of the intellectual action involves the +recognition of a sphere of thought from which all limits are +withdrawn.”[105-1] True freedom, real being, is only possible when law +as such is inexistent. Only the lawless makes the law. When the idea of +the laws of order thus disappears in that of free function consistent +with perfect order, when, as Kant expresses it, we ascend from the +contemplation of things acting according to law, to action according to +the representation of law,[105-2] we can, without audacity, believe that +we have penetrated the secret of existence, that we have reached the +limits of explanation and found one wholly satisfying the highest +reason. Intelligence, not apart from phenomena, but parallel with them, +not under law, but through perfect harmony above it, _power one with +being_, the will which is “the essence of reason,” the emanant cause of +phenomena, immanent only by the number of its relations we have not +learned, this is the satisfying and exhaustive solution. The folly lies +not in claiming reason as the absolute, but in assuming that the +absolute is beyond and against reason. + +There is nothing new in this explanation; and it is none the worse for +being old. If Anaxagoras discerned it dimly, and many a one since him +has spoken of Intelligence, Reason, Nous or Logos as the constructive +factor of the creation; if “all the riper religions of the Orient +assumed as their fundamental principle that unless the Highest +penetrates all parts of the Universe, and itself conditions whatever is +conditioned, no universal order, no Kosmos, no real existence is +thinkable;”[106-1] such inadequate expressions should never obscure the +truth that reason in its loftiest flights descries nothing nobler than +itself. + +The relative, as its name implies, for ever presupposes and points to +the absolute, the latter an Intelligence also, not one that renders ours +futile and fallacious, but one that imparts to ours the capacity we +possess of reaching eternal and ubiquitous truth. The severest +mathematical reasoning forces us to this conclusion, and we can dispense +with speculation about it. + +Only on the principle which here receives its proof, that man has +something in him of God, that the norm of the true holds good +throughout, can he know or care anything about divinity. “It takes a +god to discern a god,” profoundly wrote Novalis. + +When a religion teaches what reason disclaims, not through lack of +testimony but through a denial of the rights of reason, then that +religion wars against itself and will fall. Faith is not the acceptance +of what intelligence rejects, but a suspension of judgment for want of +evidence. A thoroughly religious mind will rejoice when its faith is +shaken with doubt; for the doubt indicates increased light rendering +perceptible some possible error not before seen. + +Least of all should a believer in a divine revelation deny the oneness +of intelligence. For if he is right, then the revealed truth he talks +about is but relative and partial, and those inspired men who claimed +for it the sign manual of the Absolute were fools, insane or liars. + +If the various arguments I have rehearsed indicate conclusively that in +the laws of thought we have the norms of absolute truth--and skepticism +on this point can be skepticism and not belief only by virtue of the +very law which it doubts--some important corollaries present themselves. + +Regarding in the first place the nature of these laws, we find them very +different from those of physical necessity--those which are called the +laws of nature. The latter are authoritative, they are never means to an +end, they admit no exception, they leave no room for error. Not so with +the laws of reasoning. Man far more frequently disregards than obeys +them; they leave a wide field for fallacy. Wherein then lies that +theoretical necessity which is the essence of law? The answer is that +the laws of reasoning are _purposive_ only, they are regulative, not +constitutive, and their theoretical necessity lies in the end, the +result of reasoning, that is, in the knowing, in the recognition of +truth. They are what the Germans call _Zweckgesetze_.[108-1] + +But in mathematical reasoning and in the processes of physical nature +the absolute character of the laws which prevail depends for its final +necessity on their consistency, their entire correspondence with the +laws of right reasoning. Applied to them the purposive character of the +laws is not seen, for their ends are fulfilled. We are brought, +therefore, to the momentous conclusion that the manifestation of Order, +whether in material or mental processes, “affords a presumption, not +measurable indeed but real, of the fulfilment of an end or +purpose;”[108-1][TN-7] and this purpose, one which has other objects in +view than the continuance of physical processes. The history of mind, +from protoplasmic sensation upward, must be a progression, whose end +will be worth more than was its beginning, a process, which has for its +purpose the satisfaction of the laws of mind. This is nothing else than +correct thinking, the attainment of truth. + +But this conclusion, reached by a searching criticism of the validity of +scientific laws, is precisely that which is the postulate of all +developed creeds. “The faith of all historical religions,” says Bunsen, +“starts from the assumption of a universal moral order, in which the +good is alone the true, and the true is the only good.”[109-1] + +The purposive nature of the processes of thought, as well as the manner +in which they govern the mind, is illustrated by the history of man. His +actions, whether as an individual or as a nation, are guided by ideas +not derived from the outer world, for they do not correspond to actual +objects, but from mental pictures of things as he wants them to exist. +These are his hopes, his wishes, his ideals; they are the more potent, +and prompt to more vigorous action, the clearer they are to his mind. +Even when he is unconscious of them, they exist as tendencies, or +instincts, inherited often from some remote ancestor, perhaps even the +heir-loom of a stage of lower life, for they occur where sensation +alone is present, and are an important factor in general evolution. + +It is usually conceded that this theory of organic development very much +attenuates the evidence of what is known as the argument from design in +nature, by which the existence of an intelligent Creator is sought to be +shown. If the distinction between the formal laws of mathematics, which +are those of nature, and logic, which are those of mind, be fully +understood, no one will seek such an argument in the former but in the +latter only, for they alone, as I have shown, are purposive, and they +are wholly so. The only God that nature points to is an adamantine Fate. + +If religion has indeed the object which Bunsen assigns it, physical +phenomena cannot concern it. Its votaries should not look to change the +operation of natural laws by incantations, prayers or miracles. + +Whenever in the material world there presents itself a seeming +confusion, it is certain to turn out but an incompleteness of our +observation, and on closer inspection it resolves itself into some +higher scheme of Order. This is not so in the realm of thought. Wrong +thinking never can become right thinking. A profound writer has said: +“One explanation only of these facts can be given, viz., that the +distinction between _true_ and _false_, between _correct_ and +_incorrect_, exists in the processes of the intellect, but not in the +region of a physical necessity.”[111-1] A religion therefore which +claims as its mission the discovery of the true and its identification +with the good,--in other words the persuading man that he should always +act in accordance with the dictates of right reasoning--should be +addressed primarily to the intellect. + +As man can attain to certain truths which are without any mixture of +fallacy, which when once he comprehends them he can never any more +doubt, and which though thus absolute do not fetter his intellect but +first give it the use of all its powers to the extent of those truths; +so he can conceive of an Intelligence in which all truth is thus without +taint of error. Not only is such an Intelligence conceivable, it is +necessary to conceive it, in order to complete the scientific induction +of “a sphere of thought from which all limits are withdrawn,” forced +upon us by the demonstrations of the exact sciences.[111-2] + +Thus do we reach the foundation for the faith in a moral government of +the world, which it has been the uniform characteristic of religions to +assert; but a government, as thus analytically reached, not easily +corresponding with that which popular religion speaks of. Such feeble +sentiments as mercy, benevolence and effusive love, scarcely find place +in this conception of the source of universal order. In this cosmical +dust-cloud we inhabit, whose each speck is a sun, man’s destiny plays a +microscopic part. The vexed question whether ours is the best possible +or the worst possible world, drops into startling insignificance. +Religion has taught the abnegation of self; science is first to teach +the humiliation of the race. Not for man’s behoof were created the +greater and the lesser lights, not for his deeds will the sun grow dark +or the stars fall, not with any reference to his pains or pleasure was +this universe spread upon the night. That Intelligence which pursues its +own ends in this All, which sees from first to last the chain of causes +which mould human action, measures not its purposes by man’s halting +sensations. Such an Intelligence is fitly described by the +philosopher-poet as one, + + “Wo die Gerechtigkeit so Wurzel schläget, + Und Schuld und Unschuld so erhaben wäget + Dass sie vertritt die Stelle aller Güte.”[112-1] + +In the scheme of the universe, pain and pleasure, truth and error, has +each its fitness, and no single thought or act can be judged apart from +all others that ever have been and ever shall be. + +Such was the power that was contemplated by the Hebrew prophet, one from +which all evil things and all good things come, and who disposes them +all to the fulfilment of a final purpose: + + “I am the Lord and there is none else. I form the light and create + darkness; I make peace and create evil.” + + “I am God and there is none like me, declaring the end from the + beginning, and from ancient times the things which are not yet + done.”[113-1] + +In a similar strain the ancient Aryan sang:-- + + “This do I ask thee, tell me, O Ahura! + Who is he, working good, made the light and also darkness? + Who is he, working good, made the sleep as well as waking? + Who the night, as well as noon and the morning?” + +And the reply came: + + “Know also this, O pure Zarathustra: through my wisdom, through + which was the beginning of the world, so also its end shall + be.”[113-2] + +Or as the Arabian apostle wrote, inspired by the same idea:-- + + “Praise the name of thy Lord, the Most High, + Who hath created and balanced all things, + Who hath fixed their destinies and guideth them.” + + “The Revelation of this book is from the Mighty, the Wise. We have + not created the Heavens and the Earth and all that is between them + otherwise than with a purpose and for a settled term.”[113-3] + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[87-1] _The Emotions and Will_, p. 594. So Professor Tyndall speaks of +confining the religious sentiment to “the region of emotion, which is +its proper sphere.” + +[87-2] H. L. Mansel, _The Limits of Religious Thought_, p. 115. (Boston, +1859.) + +[87-3] “The _one relation_ which is the ground of all true religion is a +total dependence upon God.” William Law, _Address to the Clergy_, p. 12. +“The essential germ of the religious life is concentrated in the +absolute feeling of dependence on infinite power.” J. D. Morell, _The +Philosophy of Religion_, p. 94. (New York, 1849.) This accomplished +author, well known for his _History of Philosophy_, is the most able +English exponent of the religious views of Schleiermacher and Jacobi. + +[90-1] “Weil sie die Welt _eingerichtet_ haben.” Creuzer, _Symbolik und +Mythologie der alten Vœlker_, Bd. I. s. 169. It is not of any importance +that Herodotus’ etymology is incorrect: what I wish to show is that he +and his contemporaries entertained the conception of the gods as the +authors of order. + +[92-1] This distinction is well set forth by A. von Humboldt, _Kosmos_, +p. 388 (Phila., 1869). + +[93-1] “Ueberall den Zufall zu verbannen, zu verhindern, dass in dem +Gebiete des Beobachtens und Denkens er nicht zu herrschen scheine, im +Gebiete des Handelns nicht herrsche, ist das Streben der Vernunft.” +Wilhelm von Humboldt, _Ueber Goethe’s Hermann und Dorothea_, iv. + +[93-2] “Iste ordo pulcherrimus rerum valde bonarum.” _Confessiones_, +Lib. xiii. cap. xxxv. + +[94-1] “The notion of a God is not contained in the mere notion of +Cause, that is the notion of Fate or Power. To this must be added +Intelligence,” etc. Sir Wm. Hamilton, _Lectures on Metaphysics_, Lecture +ii. + +[96-1] _The Unseen Universe_, p. 60. + +[97-1] James Frederick Ferrier, _Lectures on Greek Philosophy_, p. 13 +(Edinburgh, 1866). On a question growing directly out of this, to wit, +the relative character of good and evil, Mr. J. S. Mill expresses +himself thus: “My opinion of this doctrine is, that it is beyond all +others which now engage speculative minds, the decisive one between +moral good and evil for the Christian world.” _Examination of Hamilton’s +Philosophy_, p. 90. + +[98-1] _First Principles_, pp. 108, 127. + +[99-1] _Lectures on Metaphysics_, Vol. I., p. 690. + +[101-1] Professor Steinthal in the _Zeitschrift für Völkerpsychologie_. + +[102-1] Dr. W. Windelband, _Die Erkenntnissiehre unter dem +voelkerpsychologischem Gesichtspunkte_, in the _Zeitschrift für +Völkerpsychologie_, 1874, _Bd. VIII._ S. 165 _sqq._ + +[103-1] I would ask the reader willing to pursue this reasoning further, +to peruse the charming essay of Oersted, entitled _Das ganze Dasein Ein +Vernunftreich_. + +[104-1] Geo. Boole, _An Investigation of the Laws of Thought_, p. 407. + +[104-2] Herbert Spencer, _First Principles_, p. 112. Spinoza’s famous +proposition, previously quoted, _Unaquæque res quantum in se est, in suo +esse perseverare conatur_, (_Ethices, Pars III., Prop. VI._,) expresses +also the ultimate of modern investigation. A recent critic considers it +is a fallacy because the conatus “surreptitiously implies a sense of +effort or struggle for existence,” whereas the logical concept of a res +does not involve effort (S. N. Hodgson, _The Theory of Practice_, vol. +I. pp. 134-6, London, 1870.) The answer is that identity implies +continuance. In organic life we have the fact of nutrition, a function +whose duty is to supply waste, and hence offer direct opposition to +perturbing forces. + +[105-1] Geo. Boole, _The Laws of Thought_, p. 419. + +[105-2] Kant, _The Metaphysic of Ethics_, p. 23 (Eng. Trans. London, +1869.) + +[106-1] Creuzer, _Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Voelker_, Bd. I. s. +291. + +[108-1] See this distinction between physical and thought laws fully set +forth by Prof. Boole in the appendix to _The Laws of Thought_, and by +Dr. Windelband, _Zeitschrift für Voelkerpsychologie_, Bd. VIII., s. 165 +sqq. + +[108-2] Geo. Boole, u. s. p. 399. + +[109-1] “Der Glaube aller geschichtlichen Religionen geht aus von dieser +Annahme einer sittlichen, in Gott bewusst lebenden, Weltordnung, wonach +das Gute das allein Wahre ist, and das Wahre das allein Gute.” _Gott in +der Geschichte_, Bd. I. s. xl. Leipzig, 1857. + +[111-1] Geo. Boole, _Laws of Thought_, p. 410. + +[111-2] The latest researches in natural science confirm the expressions +of W. von Humboldt: “Das Streben der Natur ist auf etwas Unbeschränktes +gerichtet.” “Die Natur mit endlichen Mitteln unendliche Zwecke +verfolgt.” _Ueber den Geschlechtsunterschied, etc._ + +[112-1] Wilhelm von Humboldt, _Sonnette_, “Höchste Gerechtigkeit.” + +[113-1] Isaiah, xlv. 7; xlvi. 10. + +[113-2] _Khordah--avesta_, _Ormazd--Yasht_, 38, and _Yaçna_, 42. + +[113-3] _The Koran_, Suras lxxxvii., xlvi. + + + + +THE PRAYER AND ITS ANSWER. + + +SUMMARY. + + Religion starts with a Prayer. This is an appeal to the unknown, + and is indispensable in religious thought. The apparent exceptions + of Buddhism and Confucianism. + + All prayers relate to the fulfilment of a wish. At first its direct + object is alone thought of. This so frequently fails that the + indirect object rises into view. This stated to be the increase of + the pleasurable emotions. The inadequacy of this statement. + + The answers to prayer. As a form of Expectant Attention, it exerts + much subjective power. Can it influence external phenomena? It is + possible. Deeply religious minds reject both these answers, + however. They claim the objective answer to be Inspiration. All + religions unite in this claim. + + Inspirations have been contradictory. That is genuine which teaches + truths which cannot be doubted concerning duty and deity. A certain + mental condition favors the attainment of such truths. This + simulated in religious entheasm. Examples. It is allied to the most + intense intellectual action, but its steps remain unknown. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +THE PRAYER AND ITS ANSWER. + + +The foregoing analysis of the religious sentiment results in finding it, +even in its simplest forms, a product of complicated reasoning forced +into action by some of the strongest emotions, and maintaining its +position indefeasibly through the limitations of the intellect. This it +does, however, with a certain nobleness, for while it wraps the unknown +in sacred mystery, it proclaims man one in nature with the Highest, by +birthright a son of the gods, of an intelligence akin to theirs, and +less than they only in degree. Through thus presenting at once his +strength and his feebleness, his grandeur and his degradation, religion +goes beyond philosophy or utility in suggesting motives for exertion, +stimuli to labor. This phase of it will now occupy us. + +The Religious Sentiment manifests itself in thought, in word and in act +through the respective media of the Prayer, the Myth and the Cult. The +first embraces the personal relations of the individual to the object +of his worship, the second expresses the opinions current in a community +about the nature and actions of that object, the last includes the +symbols and ceremonies under and by which it is represented and +propitiated. + +The first has the logical priority. Man cares nothing for God--_can_ +care nothing for him practically--except as an aid to the fulfilment of +his desires, the satisfaction of his wants, as the “ground of his +hopes.” The root of the religious sentiment, I have said, is “a wish +whose fruition depends upon unknown power.” An appeal for aid to this +unknown power, is the first form of prayer in its religious sense. It is +not merely “the soul’s sincere desire.” This may well be and well +directed, and yet not religious, as the devotion of the mathematician to +the solution of an important problem. With the desire must be the +earnest appeal to the unknown. A theological dictionary I have at hand +almost correctly defines it as “a petition for spiritual or physical +benefits which [we believe] we cannot obtain without divine +co-operation.” The words in brackets must be inserted to complete the +definition. + +It need not be expressed in language. Rousseau, in his _Confessions_, +tells of a bishop who, in visiting his diocese, came across an old woman +who was troubled because she could frame no prayer in words, but only +cry, “Oh!” “Good mother,” said the wise bishop, “Pray always so. Your +prayers are better than ours.”[119-1] + +A petition for assistance is, as I have said, one of its first forms; +but not its only one. The assistance asked in simple prayers is often +nothing more than the neutrality of the gods, their non-interference; +“no preventing Providence,” as the expression is in our popular +religion. Prayers of fear are of this kind: + + “And they say, God be merciful, + Who ne’er said, God be praised.” + +Some of the Egyptian formulæ even threaten the gods if they prevent +success.[119-2] The wish accomplished, the prayer may be one of +gratitude, often enough of that kind described by La Rochefoucauld, of +which a prominent element is “a lively sense of possible favors to +come.”[119-3] + +Or again, self-abasement being so natural a form of flattery that to +call ourselves “obedient and humble servants” of others, has passed +into one of the commonest forms of address, many prayers are made up of +similar expressions of humility and contrition, the votary calling +himself a “miserable sinner” and a “vile worm,” and on the other hand +magnifying his Lord as greater than all other gods, mighty and helpful +to those who assiduously worship him. + +In some form or other, as of petition, gratitude or contrition, uttered +in words or confined to the aspirations of the soul, prayer is a +necessary factor in the religious life. It always has been, and it must +be present. + +The exceptions which may be taken to this in religious systems are +chiefly two, those supposed to have been founded by Buddha Sakyamuni and +Confucius. + +It is undoubtedly correct that Buddha discouraged prayer. He permitted +it at best in the inferior grades of discipleship. For himself, and all +who reached his stage of culture, he pronounced it futile. + +But Buddha did not set out to teach a religion, but rather the inutility +of all creeds. He struck shrewdly at the root of them by placing the +highest condition of man in the total extinguishment of desire. He bound +the gods in fetters by establishing a theory of causal connection (the +twelve Nidana) which does away with the necessity of ruling powers. He +then swept both matter and spirit into unreality by establishing the +canon of ignorance, that the highest knowledge is to know that nothing +is; that there is neither being nor not-being, nor yet the becoming. +After this wholesale iconoclasm the only possible object in life for the +sage is the negative one of avoiding pain, which though as unreal as +anything else, interferes with his meditations on its unreality. To this +negative end the only aid he can expect is from other sages who have +gone farther in self-cultivation. Self, therefore, is the first, the +collective body of sages is the second, and the written instruction of +Buddha is the third; and these three are the only sources to which the +consistent Buddhist looks for aid. + +This was Buddha’s teaching. But it is not Buddhism as professed by the +hundreds of millions in Ceylon, in Thibet, China, Japan, and Siberia, +who claim Sakyamuni under his names Buddha, the awakened, Tathagata, +thus gone, or gone before, Siddartha, the accomplisher of the wish, and +threescore and ten others of like purport, as their inspired teacher. +Millions of saints, holy men, Buddhas, they believe, are ready to aid in +every way the true believer, and incessant, constant prayer is, they +maintain, the one efficient means to insure this aid. Repetition, +dinning the divinities and wearying them into answering, is their +theory. Therefore they will repeat a short formula of four words (_om +mani padme hum_--Om! the jewel in the lotus, amen) thousands of times a +day; or, as they correctly think it not a whit more mechanical, they +write it a million times on strips of paper, fasten it around a +cylinder, attach this to a water or a wind-wheel, and thus sleeping or +waking, at home or abroad, keep up a steady fire of prayer at the gods, +which finally, they sanguinely hope, will bring them to submission. + +No sect has such entire confidence in the power of prayer as the +Buddhists. The most pious Mahometan or Christian does not approach their +faith. After all is said and done, the latter has room to doubt the +efficacy of his prayer. It may be refused. Not so the Buddhists. They +have a syllogism which covers the case completely, as follows:-- + + All things are in the power of the gods. + The gods are in the power of prayer. + Prayer is at the will of the saint. + Therefore all things are in the power of the saint. + +The only reason that any prayer fails is that it is not repeated often +enough--a statement difficult to refute. + +The case with Confucius was different.[122-1] No speculative dreamer, +but a practical man, bent on improving his fellows by teaching them +self-reliance, industry, honesty, good feeling and the attainment of +material comfort, he did not see in the religious systems and doctrines +of his time any assistance to these ends. Therefore, like Socrates and +many other men of ancient and modern times, without actually condemning +the faiths around him, or absolutely neglecting some external respect to +their usages, he taught his followers to turn away from religious topics +and occupy themselves with subjects of immediate utility. For questions +of duty, man, he taught, has a sufficient guide within himself. “What +you do not like,” he said, “when done to yourself, do not to others.” +The wishes, he adds, should be limited to the attainable; thus their +disappointment can be avoided by a just estimate of one’s own powers. He +used to compare a wise man to an archer: “When the archer misses the +target, he seeks for the cause of his failure within himself.” He did +not like to talk about spiritual beings. When asked whether the dead had +knowledge, he replied: “There is no present urgency about the matter. If +they have, you will know it for yourself in time.” He did not deny the +existence of unseen powers; on the contrary, he said: “The _kwei shin_ +(the most general term for supernatural beings) enter into all things, +and there is nothing without them;” but he added, “We look for them and +do not see them; we listen, but do not hear them.” In speaking of deity, +he dropped the personal syllable (_te_) and only spoke of heaven, in the +indefinite sense. Such was this extraordinary man. The utilitarian +theory, what we call the common sense view of life, was never better +taught. But his doctrine is not a religion. His followers erect temples, +and from filial respect pay the usual honors to their ancestors, as +Confucius himself did. But they ignore religious observances, strictly +so-called. + +These examples, therefore, do not at all conflict with the general +statement that no religion can exist without prayer. On the contrary, it +is the native expression of the religious sentiment, that to which we +must look for its most hidden meaning. The thoughtful Novalis, whose +meditations are so rich in reflections on the religious nature of man, +well said: “Prayer is to religion what thought is to philosophy. To pray +is to make religion. The religious sense prays with like necessity that +the reason thinks.” + +Whatever the form of the prayer, it has direct or indirect relation to +the accomplishment of a wish. David prays to the Lord as the one who +“satisfies the desire of every living thing,” who “will fulfil the +desire of them that fear him,” and it is with the like faith that the +heart of every votary is stirred when he approaches in prayer the +divinity he adores. + +Widely various are the things wished for. Their character is the test of +religions. In primitive faiths and in uncultivated minds, prayers are +confined to the nearest material advantages; they are directed to the +attainment of food, of victory in combat, of safety in danger, of +personal prosperity. They may all be summed up in a line of one which +occurs in the Rig Veda: “O Lord Varuna! Grant that we may prosper in +_getting and keeping_!” + +Beyond this point of “getting and keeping,” few primitive prayers take +us. Those of the American Indians, as I have elsewhere shown, remained +in this stage among the savage tribes, and rose above it only in the +civilized states of Mexico and Peru. Prayers for health, for plenteous +harvests, for safe voyages and the like are of this nature, though from +their familiarity to us they seem less crude than the simple-hearted +petition of the old Aryan, which I have quoted. They mean the same. + +The more thoughtful votaries of the higher forms of religion have, +however, frequently drawn the distinction between the direct and +indirect fulfilment of the wish. An abundant harvest, restoration to +health, or a victory in battle is the object of our hopes, not in +itself, but for its results upon ourselves. These, in their final +expression, can mean nothing else than agreeable sensations and +pleasurable emotions. These, therefore, are the real though indirect +objects of such prayers; often unconsciously so, because the ordinary +devotee has little capacity and less inclination to analyze the nature +of his religious feelings. + +A recent writer, Mr. Hodgson, has said: “The real answer to prayer is +the increase of the joyful emotions, the decrease of the painful +ones.”[126-1] It would seem a simpler plan to make this directly the +purport of our petitions; but to the modern mind this naked simplicity +would be distasteful. + +Nor is the ordinary supplicant willing to look so far. The direct, not +the indirect object of the wish, is what he wants. The lazzarone of +Naples prays to his patron saint to favor his choice of a lottery +ticket; if it turn out an unlucky number he will take the little leaden +image of the saint from his pocket, revile it, spit on it, and trample +it in the mud. Another man, when his prayer for success is not followed +by victory, sends gifts to the church, flogs himself in public and +fasts. Xenophon gives us in his _Economics_ the prayer of a pious +Athenian of his time, in the person of Ischomachus. “I seek to obtain,” +says the latter, “from the gods by just prayers, strength and health, +the respect of the community, the love of my friends, an honorable +termination to my combats, and riches, the fruit of honest industry.” +Xenophon evidently considered these appropriate objects for prayer, and +from the petitions in many recent manuals of devotion, I should suppose +most Christians of to-day would not see in them anything inappropriate. + +In spite of the effort that has been made by Professor Creuzer[127-1] to +show that the classical nations rose to a higher use of prayer, one +which made spiritual growth in the better sense of the phrase its main +end; I think such instances were confined to single philosophers and +poets. They do not represent the prayers of the average votary. Then and +now he, as a rule, has little or no idea of any other answer to his +prayer than the attainment of his wish. + +As such petitions, however, more frequently fail than succeed in their +direct object, and as the alternative of considering them impotent is +not open to the votary, some other explanation of their failure was +taught in very early day. At first, it was that the god was angered, and +refused the petition out of revenge. Later, the indirect purpose of such +a prayer asserted itself more clearly, and aided by a nobler conception +of Divinity, suggested that the refusal of the lower is a preparation +for a higher reward. Children, in well-ordered households, are +frequently refused by parents who love them well; this present analogy +was early seized to explain the failure of prayer. Unquestioning +submission to the divine will was inculcated. Some even went so far as +to think it improper to define any wish at all, and subsumed all prayer +under the one formula, “Thy will be done.” Such was the teaching of St. +Augustine, whose favorite prayer was _Da quod jubes, et jube quod vis_, +a phrase much criticized by Pelagius and others of his time as too +quietistic.[128-1] The usual Christian doctrine of resignation proceeds +in theory to this extent. Such a notion of the purpose of prayer leads +to a cheerful acceptance of the effects of physical laws, effects which +an enlightened religious mind never asks to be altered in its favor, for +the promises and aims of religion should be wholly outside the arena of +their operation. The ideal prayer has quite other objects than to work +material changes. + +To say, as does Mr. Hodgson, that its aim is the increase of the joyful +emotions is far from sufficient. The same may be said of most human +effort, the effort to make money, for instance. The indirect object of +money-making is also the increase of the agreeable feelings. The +similarity of purpose might lead to a belief that the aims of religion +and business are identical. + +Before we can fully decide on what, in the specifically religious sense +of the word, is the answer to prayer, we should inquire as a matter of +fact what effect it actually exerts, and to do this we should understand +what it is as a psychological process. The reply to this is that prayer, +in its psychological definition, is a form of Expectant Attention. It is +always urged by religious teachers that it must be very earnest and +continuous to be successful. “Importunity is of the essence of +successful prayer,” says Canon Liddon in a recent sermon. In the New +Testament it is likened to a constant knocking at a door; and by a +curious parity of thought the Chinese character for prayer is composed +of the signs for a spirit and an axe or hammer.[129-1] We must “keep +hammering” as a colloquial phrase has it. Strong belief is also +required. To pray with faith we must expect with confidence. + +Now that such a condition of expectant attention, prolonged and earnest, +will have a very powerful subjective effect, no one acquainted with the +functions of the human economy can doubt. “Any state of the body,” +observes the physiologist Müller, “expected with certain confidence is +very prone to ensue.” A pill of bread-crumbs, which the patient supposes +to contain a powerful cathartic, will often produce copious evacuations. +No one who studies the history of medicine can question that scrofulous +swellings and ulcerations were cured by the royal touch, that paralytics +have regained the use of their limbs by touching the relics of the +saints, and that in many countries beside Judea the laying on of hands +and the words of a holy man have made issues to heal and the lame to +walk.[130-1] + +Such effects are not disputed by physicians as probable results of +prayer or faith considered as expectant attention. The stigmata of St. +Francis d’Assisi are more than paralleled by those of Louise Lateau, now +living at Bois d’Haine in Belgium, whose hands, feet and side bleed +every Friday like those of Christ on the cross. A commission of medical +men after the most careful precautions against deception attributed +these hemorrhages to the effect of expectation (prayer) vastly +increased in force by repetition.[131-1] If human testimony is worth +anything, the cures of Porte Royale are not open to dispute.[131-2] + +The mental consequences of a prayerful condition of mind are to inspire +patience under afflictions, hope in adversity, courage in the presence +of danger and a calm confidence in the face of death itself. How +mightily such influences have worked in history is shown in every +religious war, and in the lives of the martyrs of all faiths. It matters +not what they believed, so only that they believed it thoroughly, and +the gates of Hades could not prevail against them. + +No one will question that these various and momentous results are the +legitimate effects or answers to prayers. But whether prayer can +influence the working of the material forces external to the individual +is a disputed point. If it cannot in some way do this, prayers for rain, +for harvests, for safety at sea, for restoration to health, for delivery +from grasshoppers[131-3] and pestilence, whether for our own benefit or +others, are hardly worth reciting. A physicist expresses the one opinion +in these words: “Science asserts that without a disturbance of natural +law, quite as serious as the stoppage of an eclipse or the rolling of +the St. Lawrence up the Falls of Niagara, no act of humiliation, +individual or national, could call one shower from heaven or deflect +toward us a single beam of the sun.” “Assuming the efficacy of free +prayer to produce changes in external nature, it necessarily follows +that natural laws are more or less at the mercy of man’s +volition.”[132-1] + +This authoritative statement, much discussed at the time it was +published, does not in fact express the assertion of science. To the +scientific apprehension, man’s volitions and his prayers are states of +emotion, inseparably connected in their manifestations with changes in +his cerebral structure, with relative elevation of temperature, and with +the elimination of oxygen and phosphorus, in other words with +chemico-vital phenomena and the transformation of force. Science also +adds that there is a constant interaction of all force, and it is not +prepared to deny that the force expended by a national or individual +prayer may become a co-operating cause in the material change asked +for, even if the latter be a rain shower. This would not affect a +natural law but only its operation, and that much every act of our life +does. The fact that persistency and earnestness in prayer--_i. e._, the +increased development of force--add to its efficacy, would accord with +such a scientific view. It would further be very materially corroborated +by the accepted doctrine of the orders of force. A unit of electrical or +magnetic force equals many of the force of gravity; a number of +electrical units are required to make one of chemical force; and +chemico-vital or “metabolic” force is still higher; whereas thought +regarded as a form of force must be vastly beyond this again. + +To render a loadstone, which lifts filings of iron by its magnetic +force, capable of doing the same by the force of gravity, its density +would have to be increased more than a thousand million times. All +forces differ in like degree. Professor Faraday calculated that the +force latent in the chemical composition of one drop of water, equals +that manifested in an average thunderstorm. In our limited knowledge of +the relation of forces therefore, a scientific man is rash to deny that +the chemico-vital forces set loose by an earnest prayer may affect the +operation of natural laws outside the body as they confessedly do in +it. + +Experience alone can decide such a question, and I for one, from theory +and from observation, believe in the material efficacy of prayer. In a +certain percentage of the cases where the wished-for material result +followed, the physical force of the active cerebral action has seemed to +me a co-operating cause. A physician can observe this to best advantage +in the sickness of children, as they are free from subjective bias, +their constitutions are delicately susceptible, and the prayers for them +are in their immediate vicinity and very earnest. + +But this admission after all is a barren one to the truly devout mind. +The effect gained does not depend on the God to whom the prayer is +offered. Blind physical laws bring it about, and any event that comes +through their compulsive force is gelded of its power to fecundate the +germs of the better religious life. The knowledge of this would paralyze +faith. + +Further to attenuate the value of my admission, another consideration +arises, this time prompted not by speculative criticism, but by +reverence itself. A scholar whom I have already quoted justly observes: +“Whenever we prefer a request as a means of obtaining what we wish for, +we are not praying in the religious sense of the term.”[134-1] Or, as a +recent theologian puts the same idea: “Every true prayer prays to be +refused, if the granting of it would be hurtful to us or subversive of +God’s glory.”[135-1] The real answer to prayer can never be an event or +occurrence. Only in moments of spiritual weakness and obscured vision, +when governed by his emotions or sensations, will the reverent soul ask +a definite transaction, a modification in the operation of natural laws, +still less such vulgar objects as victory, wealth or health. + +The prayer of faith finds its only true objective answer in itself, in +accepting whatever befalls as the revelation of the will of God as to +what is best. This temper of mind as the real meaning of prayer was +beautifully set forth by St. John: “If we know that he hear us, +whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of +him.”[135-2] + +But this solution of the problem does not go far enough. Prayer is +claimed to have a positive effect on the mind other than resignation. +Joyful emotions are its fruits, _spiritual enlightenment_ its reward. +These are more than cheerful acquiescence, nor can the latter come from +objects of sense. + +The most eminent teachers agree in banishing material pleasure and +prosperity from holy desires. They are of one mind in warning against +what the world and the flesh can offer, against the pursuit of riches, +power and lust. Many counsel poverty and deliberate renunciation of all +such things. Nor is the happiness they talk of that which the pursuit of +intellectual truth brings. This, indeed, confers joy, of which whoever +has tasted will not hastily return to the fleshpots of the senses, but +it is easy to see that it is not religious. Prayer and veneration have +not a part in it. Great joy is likewise given by the exercise of the +imagination when stirred by art in some of its varied forms, and a joy +more nearly allied to religion than is that of scientific investigation. +But the esthetic emotions are well defined, and are distinctly apart +from those concerned with the religious sentiment. Their most complete +satisfaction rather excludes than encourages pious meditations. That +which prayer ought to seek outside of itself is different from all of +these, its dower must be divine. + +We need not look long for it. Though hidden from the wise, it has ever +been familiar to the unlearned. Man has never been in doubt as to what +it is. He has been only too willing to believe he has received it. + +In barbarism and civilization, in the old and new worlds, the final +answer to prayer has ever been acknowledged to be _inspiration_, +revelation, the thought of God made clear to the mind of man, the +mystical hypostasis through which the ideas of the human coincide with +those of universal Intelligence. This is what the Pythian priestess, the +Siberian shaman, the Roman sibyl, the Voluspan prophetess, the Indian +medicine-man, all claimed in various degrees along with the Hebrew seers +and the Mahometan teacher.[137-1] + +The TRUTH, the last and absolute truth, is what is everywhere recognized +as, if not the only, at least the completest, the highest answer to +prayer. “Where I found the truth, there I found my God, himself the +truth,” says St. Augustine; and in a prayer by St. Chrysostom, the +“Golden Mouth,” unsurpassed in its grand simplicity, it is said: +“Almighty Father, * * grant us in this world _knowledge of Thy truth_, +and in the world to come, life everlasting.” Never has the loftiest +purpose of prayer been more completely stated. This it was that had been +promised them by Him, to whom they looked as an Intercessor for their +petitions, who had said: “I will send unto you the Comforter. * * When +he, the Spirit of Truth, is come, he will guide you unto all truth.” + +The belief that this answer is at all times attainable has always been +recognized by the Christian Church, Apostolic, Catholic, and Protestant. +Baptism was called by the Greek fathers, “enlightenment” (Φωτισμος), as +by it the believer received the spirit of truth. The Romanist, in the +dogma of infallibility, proclaims the perpetual inspiration of a living +man; the Protestant Churches in many creeds and doctrinal works extend a +substantial infallibility to all true believers, at least to the extent +that they can be inspired to recognize, if not to receive divine verity. + +The Gallican Confession of Faith, adopted in 1561, rests the principal +evidence of the truth of the Scriptures on “_le témoignage et +l’intérieure persuasion du Saint Esprit_,” and the Westminster +Confession on “the inward work of the holy spirit.” The Society of +Friends maintain it as “a leading principle, that the work of the Holy +Spirit in the soul is not only immediate and direct, but perceptible;” +that it imparts truth “without any mixture of error;” and thus is +something quite distinct from conscience, which is common to the race, +while this “inward light” is given only to the favored of God.[138-1] + +The non-juror, William Law, emphatically says: “The Christian that +rejects the necessity of immediate divine inspiration, pleads the whole +cause of infidelity; he has nothing to prove the goodness of his own +Christianity, but that which equally proves to the Deist the goodness of +his infidelity.”[139-1] That by prayer the path of duty will be made +clear, is a universal doctrine. + +The extent to which the gift of inspiration is supposed to be granted is +largely a matter of church government. Where authority prevails, it is +apt to be confined to those in power. Where religion is regarded as +chiefly subjective and individual, it is conceded that any pious votary +may become the receptacle of such special light. + +Experience, however, has too often shown that inspiration teaches such +contradictory doctrines that they are incompatible with any standard. +The indefinite splitting of Protestant sects has convinced all clear +thinkers that the claim of the early Confessions to a divinely given +power of distinguishing the true from the false has been a mistaken +supposition. As a proof to an unbeliever, such a gift could avail +nothing; and as evidence to one’s own mind, it can only be accepted by +those who deliberately shut their eyes to the innumerable contradictions +it offers.[140-1] + +While, therefore, in this, if anywhere, we perceive the only at once fit +and definite answer to prayer, and find that this is acknowledged by all +faiths, from the savage to the Christian, it would seem that this answer +is a fallacious and futile one. The teachings of inspiration are +infinitely discrepant and contradictory, and often plainly world-wide +from the truth they pretend to embody. The case seems hopeless; yet, as +religion of any kind without prayer is empty, there has been a proper +unwillingness to adopt the conclusion just stated. + +The distinction has been made that “the inspiration of the Christian is +altogether _subjective_, and directed to the moral improvement of the +individual,”[140-2] not to facts of history or questions of science, +even exegetic science. The term _illumination_ has been preferred for +it, and while it is still defined as “a spiritual intelligence which +brings truth within the range of mental apprehension by a kind of +intuition,”[141-1] this truth has reference only to immediate matters of +individual faith and practice. The Roman church allows more latitude +than this, as it sanctions revelations concerning events, but not +concerning doctrines.[141-2] + +Looked at narrowly, the advantage which inspiration has been to +religions has not so much depended on what it taught, as on its strength +as a psychological motive power. As a general mental phenomenon it does +not so much concern knowledge as belief; its province is to teach faith +rather than facts. No conviction can equal that which arises from an +assertion of God directly to ourselves. The force of the argument lies +not in the question whether he did address us, but whether we believe he +did. As a stimulus to action, prayer thus rises to a prime power. + +Belief is considered by Professor Bain and his school to be the ultimate +postulate, the final ground of intellection. It is of the utmost +importance, however,--and this Professor Bain fails to do--to +distinguish between two kinds of belief. There are men who believe and +others who disbelieve the Koran or the Bible; I can accept or reject +the historical existence of King Arthur or Napoleon; but, if I +understand them, I cannot disbelieve the demonstrations of Euclid, nor +the relations of subject and object, nor the formal laws of thought. No +sane man, acquainted with the properties of numbers, can believe that +twice three are ten, or that a thing can be thought as other than +itself. These truths that “we cannot help believing,” I have defined in +the first chapter as absolute truths. They do not come to us through +testimony and induction, but through a process variously called +“immediate perception,” “apprehension,” or “intuition,” a process long +known but never satisfactorily explained. + +All such truths are analytic, that is, they are true, not merely for a +given time or place, but at all times and places conceivable, or, time +and space out of the question, they still remain formally true. Of +course, therefore, they cannot refer to historic occurrences nor +phenomena. The modern position, that truth lies in facts, must be +forsaken, and with the ancients, we must place it in ideas. + +If we define inspiration as that condition of mind which is in the +highest degree sensitive to the presence of such truth, we have of it +the only worthy idea which it is possible to frame. The object of +scientific investigation is to reach a truth which can neither be denied +nor doubted. If religion is willing to content itself with any lower +form of truth, it cannot support its claims to respect, let alone +reverence. + +It may be said that the subjects with which the religious sentiment +concerns itself are not such as are capable of this absolute expression. +This is, however, disclaimed by all great reformers, and by none more +emphatically than by him who said: “Heaven and earth shall pass away, +but my statements (λογοι) shall not pass away.” There is clear reference +here to absolute truths. If what we know of God, duty and life, is not +capable of expression except in historic narrative and synthetic terms, +the sooner we drop their consideration the better. That form sufficed +for a time, but can no longer, when a higher is generally known. As the +mathematical surpasses the historic truth, so the former is in turn +transcended by the purely logical, and in this, if anywhere, religion +must rest its claims for recognition. Here is the arena of the theology +of the future, not in the decrees of councils, nor in the records of +past time. + +Inspiration, in its religious sense, we may, therefore, define to be +that condition of mind in which the truths relating to deity and duty +become in whole or in part the subjects of immediate perception. + +That such a condition is possible will be granted. Every reformer who +has made a permanent betterment in the religion of his time has +possessed it in some degree. He who first conceived the Kosmos under +logical unity as an orderly whole, had it in singular power; so too had +he who looking into the mind became aware of its purposive laws which +are the everlasting warrants of duty. Some nations have possessed it in +remarkable fulness, none more so than the descendants of Abraham, from +himself, who left his kindred and his father’s house at the word of God, +through many eminent seers down to Spinoza, who likewise forsook his +tribe to obey the inspirations vouchsafed him; surpassing them all, +Jesus of Nazareth, to whose mind, as he waxed in wisdom, the truth +unfolded itself in such surpassing clearness that neither his immediate +disciples nor any generations since have fathomed all the significance +of his words. + +Such minds do not need development and organic transmission of thought +to enrich their stores. We may suppose the organization of their brains +to be so perfect that their functions are always accordant with true +reasoning, so self-prompting, that a hint of the problem is all they ask +to arrive at its demonstration. Blaise Pascal, when a boy of twelve, +whose education had been carefully restrained, once asked his father +what is geometry. The latter replied that it is a method devised to draw +figures correctly, but forbade any further inquiry about it. On this +hint Pascal, by himself, unassisted, without so much as knowing the name +of a line or circle, reached in a few weeks to the demonstration of the +thirty-second problem of the first book of Euclid! Is it not possible +for a mind equally productive of religious truth to surpass with no less +ease its age on such subjects? + +As what Newton so well called “patient thought,” constant application, +prolonged attention, is the means on which even great minds must rely in +order to reach the sempiternal verities of science, so earnest continued +prayer is that which all teachers prescribe as the only avenue to +inspiration in its religious sense. While this may be conceded, +collaterals of the prayer have too often been made to appear trivial and +ridiculous. + +In the pursuit of inspiration the methods observed present an +interesting similarity. The votary who aspires to a communion with the +god, shuts himself out from the distraction of social intercourse and +the disturbing allurements of the senses. In the solitude of the forest +or the cell, with complete bodily inaction, he gives himself to fasting +and devotion, to a concentration of all his mind on the one object of +his wish, the expected revelation. Waking and sleeping he banishes all +other topics of thought, perhaps by an incessant repetition of a +formula, until at last the moment comes, as it surely will come in some +access of hallucination, furor or ecstasy, the unfailing accompaniments +of excessive mental strain, when the mist seems to roll away from the +mortal vision, the inimical powers which darkened the mind are baffled, +and the word of the Creator makes itself articulate to the creature. + +Take any connected account of the revelation of the divine will, and +this history is substantially the same. It differs but little whether +told of Buddha Sakyamuni, the royal seer of Kapilavastu, or by Catherine +Wabose, the Chipeway squaw,[146-1] concerning the _Revelations_ of St. +Gertrude of Nivelles or of Saint Brigida, or in the homely language of +the cobbler George Fox. + +For six years did Sakyamuni wander in the forest, practising the +mortifications of the flesh and combatting the temptations of the +devil,before[TN-8] the final night when, after overcoming the crowning +enticements of beauty, power and wealth, at a certain moment he became +the “awakened,” and knew himself in all his previous births, and with +that knowledge soared above the “divine illusion” of existence. In the +cave of Hari, Mohammed fasted and prayed until “the night of the divine +decisions;” then he saw the angel Gabriel approach and inspire him: + + “A revelation was revealed to him: + One terrible in power taught it him, + Endowed with wisdom. With firm step stood he, + There, where the horizon is highest, + Then came he near and nearer, + A matter of two bowshots or closer, + And he revealed to his servant a revelation; + He has falsified not what he saw.”[147-1] + +With not dissimilar preparation did George Fox seek the “openings” which +revealed to him the hollowness of the Christianity of his day, in +contrast to the truth he found. In his _Journal_ he records that for +months he “fasted much, walked around in solitary places, and sate in +hollow trees and lonesome places, and frequently in the night walked +mournfully about.” When the word of truth came to him it was of a +sudden, “through the immediate opening of the invisible spirit.” Then a +new life commenced for him: “Now was I come up in Spirit through the +flaming sword into the Paradise of God. All things were new: all the +creation gave another smell unto me than before.” The healing virtues of +all herbs were straightway made known to him, and the needful truths +about the kingdom of God.[147-2] + +These are portraitures of the condition of _entheasm_. Its lineaments +are the same, find it where we may. + +How is this similarity to be explained? Is it that this alleged +inspiration is always but the dream of a half-crazed brain? The deep and +real truths it has now and then revealed, the noble results it has +occasionally achieved, do not allow this view. A more worthy explanation +is at hand. + +These preliminaries of inspiration are in fact but a parody, sometimes a +caricature, of the most intense intellectual action as shown in the +efforts of creative thought. The physiological characteristics of such +mental episodes indicate a lowering of the animal life, the respiration +is faint and slow, the pulse loses in force and frequency, the nerves of +special sense are almost inhibited, the eye is fixed and records no +impression, the ear registers no sound, necessary motions are performed +unconsciously, the condition approaches that of trance. There is also an +alarming similarity at times between the action of genius and of +madness, as is well known to alienists. + +When the creative thought appears, it does so suddenly; it breaks upon +the mind when partly engaged with something else as an instantaneous +flash, apparently out of connection with previous efforts. This is the +history of all great discoveries, and it has been abundantly illustrated +from the lives of inventors, artists, poets and mathematicians. The +links of such a mental procedure we do not know. “The product of +inspiration, genius, is incomprehensible to itself. Its activity +proceeds on no beaten track, and we seek in vain to trace its footsteps. +There is no warrant for the value of its efforts. This it can alone +secure through voluntary submission to law. All its powers are centred +in the energy of production, and none is left for idle watching of the +process.”[149-1] + +The prevalent theory of the day is that this mental action is one +essentially hidden from the mind itself. The name “unconscious +cerebration” has been proposed for it by Dr. Carpenter, and he has amply +and ably illustrated its peculiarities. But his theory has encountered +just criticism, and I am persuaded does not meet the requirements of the +case. Whether at such moments the mind actually receives some impulse +from without, as is the religious theory, or, as science more willingly +teaches, certain associations are more easily achieved when the mind is +partially engaged with other trains of ideas, we cannot be sure. We can +only say of it, in the words of Dr. Henry Maudsley, the result “is truly +an inspiration, coming we know not whence.” Whatever it is, we recognize +in it the original of that of which religious hallucination is the +counterfeit presentment. So similar are the processes that their +liability to be confounded has been expressly guarded against.[150-1] + +The prevalence of such caricatures does not prove the absence of the +sterling article. They rather show that the mind is conscious of the +possibility of reaching a frame or mood in which it perceives what it +seeks, immediately and correctly. Buddhism distinctly asserts this to be +the condition of “the stage of intuitive insight;” and Protestant +Christianity commenced with the same opinion. Every prayer for guidance +in the path of duty assumes it. The error is in applying such a method +where it is incompatible, to facts of history and the phenomena of +physical force. Confined to the realm of ideas, to which alone the norm +of the true and untrue is applicable, there is no valid evidence +against, and many theoretical reasons for, respecting prayer as a fit +psychological preparation for those obscure and unconscious processes, +through which the mind accomplishes its best work. + +The intellect, exalted by dwelling upon the sublimest subjects of +thought, warmed into highest activity by the flames of devotion, +spurning as sterile and vain the offers of time and the enticements of +sense, may certainly be then in the mood fittest to achieve its greatest +victories. But no narrowed heaven must cloud it, no man-made god +obstruct its gaze. Free from superstition and prejudice, it must be +ready to follow wherever the voice of reason shall lead it. All inspired +men have commenced by freeing themselves from inherited forms of Belief +in order that with undiverted attention they might listen to the +promptings of the divinity within their souls. One of the greatest of +them and one the most free from the charge of prejudice, has said that +to this end prayer is the means.[151-1] + +He who believes that the ultimate truth is commensurate with reason, +finds no stumbling-block in the doctrine that there may be laws through +whose action inspiration is the enlightenment of mind as it exists in +man, by mind as it underlies the motions which make up matter. The truth +thus reached is not the formulæ of the Calculus, nor the verbiage of the +Dialectic, still less the events of history, but that which gives what +validity they have to all of these, and moreover imparts to the will and +the conscience their power to govern conduct. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[119-1] The “silent worship” of the Quakers is defended by the writers +of that sect, on the ground that prayer is “often very imperfectly +performed and sometimes materially interrupted by the use of words.” +Joseph John Gurney, _The Distinguishing Views and Practice of the +Society of Friends_, p. 300. (London, 1834.) + +[119-2] Creuzer, _Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Völker_, Bd. I., s. +162. + +[119-3] The learned Bishop Butler, author of the _Analogy of Religion_, +justly gives prominence to “our expectation of future benefits,” as a +reason for gratitude to God. _Sermons_, p. 155. (London, 1841.) + +[122-1] The expressions of Confucius’ religious views may be found in +_The Doctrine of the Mean_, chaps. xiii., xvi., the _Analects_, i., 99, +100, vii., and in a few other passages of the canonical books. + +[126-1] _An Inquiry into the Theory of Practice_, p. 330. + +[127-1] _Symbolik und Mythologie der Alten Völker._ Bd. I., ss. 165, +sqq. One of the most favorable examples (not mentioned by Creuzer) is +the formula with which Apollonius of Tyana closed every prayer and gave +as the summary of all: “Give me, ye Gods, what I deserve”--Δοιητε μοι τα +οφειλομενα. The Christian’s comment on this would be in the words of +Hamlet’s reply to Polonius: “God’s bodkin, man! use every man after his +desert and who should ’scape whipping?” + +[128-1] Aurelii Augustini, _De Dono Perseverantiæ_, cap. xx. Comte +remarks “Depuis St. Augustin toutes les âmes pures ont de plus en plus +senti, à travers l’égoisme Chrétien, que prier peut n’être pas +demander.” _Système de Politique Positive_, I., p. 260. Popular +Protestantism has retrograded in this respect. + +[129-1] Plath, _Die Religion und Cultus der alten Chineser_, s. 836. +This author observes that the Chinese prayers are confined to temporal +benefits only, and are all either prayers of petition or gratitude. +Prayers of contrition are unknown. + +[130-1] Numerous examples can be found in medical text books, for +instance in Dr. Tuke’s, _The Influence of the Mind on the Body_. London, +1873. + +[131-1] The commission appointed by the Royal Academy of Medicine of +Belgium on Louise Lateau reported in March, 1875, and most of the +medical periodicals of that year contain abstracts of its paper. + +[131-2] They may be found in the life of Pascal, written by his sister, +and in many other works of the time. + +[131-3] It is worthy of note, as an exponent of the condition of +religious thought in 1875, that in May of that year the Governor of the +State of Missouri appointed by official proclamation a day of prayer to +check the advance of the grasshoppers. He should also have requested the +clergy to pronounce the ban of the Church against them, as the Bishop of +Rheims did in the ninth century. + +[132-1] Tyndall, _On Prayer and Natural Law_, 1872. + +[134-1] S. M. Hodgson, _An Inquiry into the Theory of Practice_, pp. +329, 330. + +[135-1] The Rev. Dr. Thomas K. Conrad, _Thoughts on Prayer_, p. 54: New +York, 1875. + +[135-2] I. John, v. 15. “There are millions of prayers,” says Richard +Baxter, “that will all be found answered at death and judgment, which we +know not to be answered any way but by believing it.” _A Christian +Directory_, Part II. chap. xxiii. + +[137-1] “So wie das Gebet ein Hauptwurzel alter Lehre war, so war das +Deuten und Offenbaren ihre ursprüngliche Form.” Creuzer, _Symbolik und +Mythologie der alten Völker_, Bd. I., s. 10. It were more accurate to +say that divination is the answer to, rather than a form of prayer. + +[138-1] Joseph John Gurney, _The Distinguishing Views and Practices of +the Society of Friends_, pp. 58, 59, 76, 78. An easy consequence of this +view was to place the decrees of the internal monitor above the written +word. This was advocated mainly by Elias Hicks, who expressed his +doctrine in the words: “As no spring can rise higher than its fountain, +so likewise the Scriptures can only direct to the fountain whence they +originated--the Spirit of Truth.” _Letters of Elias Hicks_, p. 228 +(Phila., 1861). + +[139-1] _Address to the Clergy_, p. 67. + +[140-1] See an intelligent note on this subject in the Rev. Wm. Lee’s +work, entitled _The Inspiration of the Holy Scriptures_, pp. 44, 47 +(London and New York, 1857). + +[140-2] Rev. William Lee, _u. s._, p. 243. + +[141-1] Blunt, _Dictionary of Doctrinal and Historical Theology_, s. v. + +[141-2] There is a carefully written essay on the views of the Romish +Church on this subject, preceding _The Revelations of Saint Brigida_ (N. +Y. 1875). + +[146-1] Chusco or Catherine Wabose, “the prophetess of Chegoimegon,” has +left a full and psychologically most valuable account of her +inspiration. It is published in Schoolcraft’s _History and Statistics of +the Indian Tribes_, Vol. I., p. 390, sqq. + +[147-1] _The Koran_, Sura liii. This is in date one of the earliest +suras. + +[147-2] _The Journal of George Fox_, pp. 59, 67, 69. + +[149-1] Wilhelm von Humboldt, _Gesammelte Werke_, Bd. iv., s. 278. + +[150-1] In his treatise _De Veritate_, itself the subject, as its author +thought, of a special revelation, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, gives as one +of the earmarks of a real revelation: “ut afflatum Divini numinis +sentias, ita enim internæ Facultatum circa veritatem operationes a +revelationibus externis distinguuntur.” p. 226. + +[151-1] Spinoza, _Espistolæ et Responsionnes_, Ep. xxxiv. + + + + +THE MYTH AND THE MYTHICAL CYCLES. + + +SUMMARY. + + Myths are inspirations concerning the Unknown. Science treats them + as apperceptions of the relations of man and nature. Moments of + their growth, as treated by mythological science. Their similar + forms, explained variously, the topic of the philosophy of + mythology. The ante-mythical period. Myths have centred chiefly + around three subjects, each giving rise to a Mythical Cycle. + + I. The Epochs of Nature. + + The idea of Time led to the myth of a creation. This starting the + question, What was going on before creation? recourse was had to + the myth of recurrent epochs. The last epoch gave origin to the + Flood Myths; the coming one to that of the Day of Judgment. + + II. The Paradise lost and to be re-gained. + + To man, the past and the future are ever better than the present. + He imagines a Golden Age in the past and believes it will return. + The material Paradise he dreams of in his ruder conditions, becomes + a spiritual one with intellectual advancement. The basis of this + belief. + + III. The Hierarchy of the Gods. + + The earliest hierarchy is a dual classification of the gods into + those who help and those who hinder the fruition of desire. Light + and darkness typify the contrast. Divinity thus conceived under + numerical separateness. Monotheisms do not escape this. The triune + nature of single gods. The truly religious and only philosophic + notion of divinity is under logical, not mathematical unity. This + discards mythical conceptions. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + +THE MYTH AND THE MYTHICAL CYCLES. + + +Returning again to the definition of the elemental religious +sentiment--“a Wish whose fruition depends upon unknown power”--it +enables us to class all those notions, opinions and narratives, which +constitute mythologies, creeds and dogmas, as theories respecting the +nature and action of the unknown power. Of course they are not +recognized as theories. They arise unconsciously or are received by +tradition, oral or written, and always come with the stamp of divinity +through inspiration and revelation. None but a god can tell the secrets +of the gods. + +Therefore they are the most sacred of all things, and they partake of +the holiness and immutability which belong to the unknown power itself. +To misplace a vowel point in copying the sacred books was esteemed a sin +by the Rabbis, and a pious Mussulman will not employ the same pen to +copy a verse of the Koran and an ordinary letter. There are many +Christians who suppose the saying: “Heaven and earth shall pass away, +but My Words shall not pass away,” has reference to the words of the Old +and New Testament. “What shall remain to us,” asked Ananda, the disciple +of Buddha, “when thou shalt have gone hence into Nirvana?” “My Word +(_dharma_),” replied the Master. Names thus came to be as holy as the +objects to which they referred. So sacred was that of Jehovah to the +Israelites that its original sound was finally lost. Such views are +consistent enough to the Buddhist, who, assuming all existence to be but +imaginary, justly infers that the name is full as much as the object. + +The science of mythology has made long strides in the last half century. +It has left far behind it the old euphemeristic view that the myth is a +distorted historical tradition, as well as the theories not long since +in vogue, that it was a system of natural philosophy, a device of shrewd +rulers, or as Bacon thought, a series of “instructive fables.” The +primitive form of the myth is now recognized to be made up from the +notions which man gains of the manifestations of force in external +nature, in their supposed relations to himself. In technical language it +may be defined as _the apperception of man and nature under synthetic +conceptions_.[156-1] + +This primitive form undergoes numerous changes, to trace and illustrate +which, has been the special task assumed by the many recent writers on +mythology. In some instances these changes are owing to the blending of +the myth with traditions of facts, forming a quasi-historical narrative, +the _saga;_ in others, elaborated by a poetic fancy and enriched by the +imagination, it becomes a fairy tale, the _märchen_. Again, the myth +being a product of creative thought, existing in words only, as language +changes, it alters through forgetfulness of the earlier meanings of +words, through similarities in sounds deceiving the ear, or through a +confusion of the literal with the metaphorical signification of the same +word. The character of languages also favors or retards such changes, +pliable and easily modified ones, such as those of the American Indians, +and in a less degree those of the Aryan nations, favoring a developed +mythology, while rigid and monosyllabic ones, as the Chinese and Semitic +types, offer fewer facilities to such variations. Furthermore, tribal or +national history, the peculiar difficulties which retard the growth of +a community, and the geographical and climatic character of its +surroundings, give prominence to certain features in its mythology, and +to the absence of others. Myths originally diverse are blended, either +unconsciously, as that of the Roman Saturn with the Greek Cronus; or +consciously, as when the medieval missionaries transferred the deeds of +the German gods to Christian saints. Lastly, the prevailing temperament +of a nation, its psychology, gives a strong color to its mythical +conceptions, and imprints upon them the national peculiarities. + +The judicious student of mythology must carefully weigh all these +formative agents, and assign each its value. They are all present in +every mythology, but in varying force. His object is accomplished when +he can point out the causal relation between the various features of a +myth and these governing agencies. + +Such is the science of mythology. The philosophy of mythology undertakes +to set forth the unities of form which exist in various myths, and +putting aside whatever of this uniformity is explainable historically, +proposes to illustrate from what remains the intellectual need myths +were unconsciously framed to gratify, to measure their success in this +attempt, and if they have not been wholly successful, to point out why +and in what respect they have failed. In a study preliminary to the +present one, I have attempted to apply the rules of mythological science +to the limited area of the native American race; in the present chapter +I shall deal mainly with the philosophy of mythology. + +The objection may be urged at starting that there is no such unity of +form in myths as the philosophy of mythology assumes; that if it +appears, it is always explainable historically. + +A little investigation sets this objection aside. Certain features must +be common to all myths. A divinity must appear in them and his doings +with men must be recorded. A reasonable being can hardly think at all +without asking himself, “Whence come I, my fellows, and these things +which I see? And what will become of us all?” So some myth is sure to be +created at an early stage of thought which the parent can tell the +child, the wise man his disciple, containing responses to such +questions. + +But this reasoning from probability is needless, for the similarity of +mythical tales in very distant nations, where no hypothesis of ancient +intercourse is justified, is one of the best ascertained and most +striking discoveries of modern mythological investigation.[159-1] The +general character of “solar myths” is familiar to most readers, and the +persistency with which they have been applied to the explanation of +generally received historical facts, as well as to the familiar fairy +tales of childhood, has been pushed so far as to become the subject of +satire and caricature. The myths of the Dawn have been so frequently +brought to public notice in the popular writings of Professor Max +Müller, that their general distribution may be taken as well known. The +same may be said of the storm myths. Wilhelm von Humboldt, who thought +deeply on the religious nature of man, said early in this century: +“Wholly similar myths can very readily arise in different localities, +each independent of the others.”[160-1] + +This similarity is in a measure owing to the similar impressions which +the same phenomenon, the sunrise or the thunder-storm for instance, +makes on the mind--and to this extent the science of mythology is +adequate to its explanation. But that it falls short is so generally +acknowledged, that various other explanations have been offered. + +These may be classed as the skeptical explanation, which claims that the +likeness of the myths is vastly exaggerated and much more the work of +the scholar at his desk than of the honest worshipper; the historical +explanation, which suggests unrecorded proselytisms, forgotten +communications and the possible original unity of widely separated +nations; the theological explanations, often discrepant, one suggesting +caricatures of the sacred narrative inspired by the Devil, another +reminiscences of a primeval inspiration, and a third the unconscious +testimony of heathendom to orthodoxy;[161-1] and lastly the metaphysical +explanation, which seems at present to be the fashionable one, expressed +nearly alike by Steinthal and Max Müller, which cuts the knot by +crediting man with “an innate consciousness of the Absolute,” or as +Renan puts it, “a profound instinct of deity.” + +The philosophy of mythology, differing from all these, finding beyond +question similarities which history cannot unriddle, interprets them by +no incomprehensible assumption, but by the identity of the laws of +thought acting on similar impressions under the guidance of known +categories of thought. Nor does it stop here, but proceeds to appraise +these results by the general scheme of truth and error. It asks for +what psychological purpose man has so universally imagined for himself +gods--pure creations of his fancy;--whether that purpose can now or will +ultimately be better attained by an exercise of his intellect more in +accordance with the laws of right reasoning; and thus seeking to define +the genuine food of the religious desire, estimates the quality and +value of each mythological system by the nearness of its approach to +this standard. + +The philosophy of mythology, starting with the wish or prayer as the +unit of religious thought, regards all myths as theories about the +unknown power which is supposed to grant or withhold the accomplishment +of the wish. These theories are all based upon the postulate of the +religious sentiment, that there is order in things; but they differ from +scientific theories in recognizing volition as an efficient cause of +order. + +The very earliest efforts at religious thought do not rise to the +formation of myths, that is, connected narratives about supernatural +beings. All unknown power is embraced under a word which does not convey +the notion of personality; single exhibitions of power which threaten +man’s life are supposed to be the doings of an unseen person, often of a +deceased man, whose memory survives; but any general theory of a +hierarchy, or of the world or man, is not yet visible. Even such +immature notions are, however, so far as they go, framed within the +category of causality; only, the will of the god takes the place of all +other force. This stage of religious thought has been called Animism, a +name which does not express its peculiarity, which is, that all force is +not only supposed to proceed from mind, but through what metaphysicians +call “immanent volition,” that is, through will independent of relation. +Mind as “emanant volition,” in unison with matter and law, the “seat of +law,” to use an expression of Professor Boole’s, may prove the highest +conception of force. + +As the slowly growing reason reached more general notions, the law which +prescribes unity as a condition of thought led man early in his history +to look upon nature as one, and to seek for some one law of its changes; +the experience of social order impressed him with the belief that the +unseen agencies around him also bore relations to each other, and +acknowledged subjection to a leader; and the pangs of sickness, hunger +and terror to which he was daily exposed, and more than all the “last +and greatest of all terribles, death,” which he so often witnessed, +turned his early meditations toward his own origin and destiny. + +Around these three subjects of thought his fancy busied itself, striving +to fabricate some theory which would solve the enigmas which his reason +everywhere met, some belief which would relieve him from the haunting +horror of the unknown. Hence arose three great cycles of myths, which +recur with strangely similar physiognomies in all continents and among +all races. They are the myths of the Epochs of Nature, the Hierarchy of +the Gods, and of the Paradise lost but to be regained. Wherever we turn, +whether to the Assyrian tablets or to the verses of the Voluspa, to the +crude fancies of the red man of the new world or the black man of the +African plateau, to the sacred books of the modern Christian or of the +ancient Brahman, we find these same questions occupying his mind, and in +meaning and in form the same solutions proffered. Through what +intellectual operations he reached these solutions, and their validity, +as tested by the known criteria of truth, it is the province of the +philosophy of mythology to determine. + +Let us study the psychological growth of the myth of the Epochs of +Nature. This tells of the World, its beginning, its convulsions and its +ending, and thus embraces the three minor cycles of the cosmogonical, +the cataclysmal and the eschatological myths. + +Nature is known to man only as _force_, which manifests itself in +_change_. He is so constituted that “the idea of an event, a change, +without the idea of a cause, is impossible” to him. But in passing from +the occurrence to its cause the idea of Time is unavoidable; it presents +itself as the one inevitable condition of change; itself unwearing, it +wears out all else; it includes all existence, as the greater does the +less; and as “causation is necessarily within existence,”[165-1] time is +beyond existence and includes the nonexistent as well. Whatever it +creates, it also destroys; and as even the gods are but existences, it +will swallow them. It renders vain all pleasures, and carries the balm +of a certain oblivion for all woes. + +This oppressive sense of time, regarded not in its real meaning as one +of the conditions of perception, but as an active force destroying +thought as well as motion, recurs continually in mythology. To the +Greek, indefinite time as Cronos, was the oldest of the gods, begetting +numberless children, but with unnatural act consuming them again; while +definite time, as the Horæ, were the blithe goddesses of the order in +nature and the recurrent seasons. Osiris, supreme god of the Egyptians, +was born of a yet older god, Sev, Time. Adonis and Aeon acknowledge the +same parentage.[165-2] The ancient Arab spoke of time (_dahr_, _zaman_) +as the final, defining principle; as uniting and separating all things; +and as swallowing one thing after another as the camel drains the water +from a trough.[166-1] In the Koran it is written: “Time alone destroys +us.” Here and there, through the sacred songs of the Parsees, composed +long before Aristotle wrote, beyond all the dust and noise of the +everlasting conflict of good and evil, of Ahura Mazda and Anya-Mainyus, +there are glimpses of a deeper power, Zeruana Akerana, Eternal Duration, +unmoved by act or thought, in the face of which these bitter opponents +are seen to be children, brethren, “twin sons of Time.”[166-2] The +Alexandrian Gnostics, in their explanations of Christian dogmas, +identify Aeon, infinite time, with God the Father, as the source and +fount of existence; not merely as a predicate of the highest, but the +Highest himself. + +This heavy-weighing sense of the infinity of duration, and the urgency +of escaping from the weariness of thinking it, led to the construction +of the myth of the Creation. Man devised it so that he might be able to +say, “in the beginning.” But a new difficulty met him at the +threshold--as change must be in existence, “we cannot think of a change +from non-existence to existence.” His only refuge was to select some +apparently primordial, simple, homogeneous substance from which, by the +exertion of volition, things came into being. The one which most +naturally suggested itself was _water_.[167-1] This does in fact cover +and hide the land, and the act of creation was often described as the +emerging of the dry land from the water; it dissolves and wears away the +hard rock; and, diminishing all things, itself neither diminishes nor +increases. Therefore nearly all cosmogonical myths are but variations of +that one familiar to us all: “And God said, Let the waters under the +heaven be gathered together in one place, and let the dry land appear; +and it was so.” The manifestation of the primordial energy was supposed +to have been akin to that which is shown in organic reproduction. The +myths of the primeval egg from which life proceeded, of the mighty bird +typical of the Holy Spirit which “brooded” upon the waters, of Love +developing the Kosmos from the Chaos, of the bull bringing the world +from the waters, of Protogonus, the “egg-born,” the “multispermed,” and +countless others, point to the application of one or the other, or of +both these explanations.[167-2] + +In them the early thinkers found some rest: but not for long. The +perplexity of the presence of this immediate order of things seemed +solved; but another kept obtruding itself: what was going on before that +“beginning?” Vain to stifle the inquiry by replying, “nothing.”[168-1] +For time, which knows no beginning, was there, still building, still +destroying; nothing can be put to it, nor anything taken from it. What +then is left but the conclusion of the Preacher: “That which hath been, +is now; and that which is to be, hath already been?” Regarding time as a +form of force, the only possible history of the material universe is +that it is a series of destructions and restorations, force latent +evolving into force active or energy, and this dissipated and absorbed +again into latency. + +Expressed in myths, these destructions and restorations are the Epochs +of Nature. They are an essential part of the religious traditions of the +Brahmans, Persians, Parsees, Greeks, Egyptians, Jews, Mexicans, Mayas, +and of all nations who have reached a certain stage of culture. The +length of the intervening periods may widely differ. The kalpa or great +year of the Brahmans is so long that were a cube of granite a hundred +yards each way brushed once in a century by a soft cloth, it would be +quite worn to dust before the kalpa would close: or, as some Christians +believe, there may be but six thousand years, six days of God in whose +sight “a thousand years are as one day,” between the creation and the +cremation of the world, from when it rose from the waters until it shall +be consumed by the fire. + +There were also various views about the agents and the completeness of +these periodical destructions. In the Norse mythology and in the +doctrine of Buddhism, not one of the gods can survive the fire of the +last day. Among the Greeks, great Jove alone will await the appearance +of the virgin world after the icy winter and the fiery summer of the +Great Year. The Brahmans hold that the higher classes of gods outlive +the wreck of things which, at the close of the day of Brahm, involves +all men and many divinities in elemental chaos; while elsewhere, in the +later Puranas and in the myths of Mexico, Peru, and Assyria, one or a +few of the race of man escape a deluge which is universal, and serve to +people the new-made earth. This latter supposition, in its application +to the last epoch of nature, is the origin of the myth of the Flood. + +In its general features and even in many details, the story of a vast +overflow which drowned the world, and from which by the timely succor +of divinity some man was preserved, and after the waters had subsided +became the progenitor of the race, is exceedingly common among distant +tribes, where it is impossible to explain it as a reminiscence of a +historic occurrence, or by community of religious doctrine. In Judea +Noah, in India Manu, in Chaldea Xisuthrus, in Assyria Oannes, in Aztlan +Nata, in Algonkin tradition Messou, in Brazil Monan, etc., are all +heroes of similar alleged occurrences. In all of them the story is but a +modification of that of the creation in time from the primeval +waters.[170-1] + +“As it was once, so it shall be again,” and as the present age of the +world wears out, the myth teaches that things will once more fall back +to universal chaos. “The expectation of the end of the world is a +natural complement to the belief in its periodical destructions.” It is +taught with distinctness by all religious systems, by the prophetess in +the Voluspa, by the Hebrew seers,[171-1] by the writer of the +Apocalypse, by the Eastern sages, Persian and Indian, by the Roman +Sibyl, and among the savage and semi-civilized races of the New World. + +Often that looked for destruction was associated with the divine plans +for man. This was an addition to the simplicity of the original myth, +but an easy and a popular one. The Indian of our prairies still looks +forward to the time when the rivers shall rise, and submerging the land +sweep from its surface the pale-faced intruders, and restore it to its +original owners. Impatient under the ceaseless disappointments of life, +and worn out with the pains which seem inseparable from this condition +of things, the believer gives up his hopes for this world, and losing +his faith in the final conquest of the good, thinks it only attainable +by the total annihilation of the present conditions. He looks for it, +therefore, in the next great age, in the new heaven and the new earth, +when the spirit of evil shall be bound and shut up, and the chosen +people possess the land, “and grow up as calves of the stall.”[172-1] + +This is to be inaugurated by the Day of Judgment, “the day of wrath, the +dreadful day,” in which God is to come in his power and pronounce his +final decrees on those who have neglected the observance due him. The +myth, originally one relating to the procession of natural forces, thus +assumed with the increasing depth of the religious sentiment more and +more a moral and subjective coloring, until finally its old and simple +form was altogether discarded, or treated as symbolic only. + +The myth of the Epochs of Nature was at first a theory to account for +the existing order of nature. For a long time it satisfied the inquiring +mind, if not with a solution at least with an answer to its queries. +After geologic science had learned to decipher the facts of the world’s +growth as written on the stones which orb it, the religious mind fondly +identified the upheavals and cataclysms there recorded with those which +its own fancy had long since fabricated. The stars and suns, which the +old seer thought would fall from heaven in the day of wrath, were seen +to be involved in motions far beyond the pale of man’s welfare, and, +therefore, the millennial change was confined to the limits of our +planet. Losing more and more of its original form as an attempted +explanation of natural phenomena, the myth now exists in civilized +nations as an allegorical type of man’s own history and destiny, and +thus is slowly merging into an episode of the second great cycle of the +mythus, that of the Paradise lost and regained. It, too, finds its +interpretation in psychology. + +Broadly surveying the life of man, philosophers have found in it much +matter fit either for mockery or tears. We are born with a thirst for +pleasure; we learn that pain alone is felt. We ask health; and having +it, never notice it till it is gone. In the ardent pursuit of enjoyment, +we waste our capacity of appreciation. Every sweet we gain is sauced +with a bitter. Our eyes forever bent on the future, which can never be +ours, we fritter away the present, which alone we possess. Ere we have +got ourselves ready to live, we must die. Fooling ourselves even here, +we represent death as the portal to joy unspeakable; and forthwith +discredit our words by avoiding it in every possible way. + +Pitiable spectacle of weakness and folly, is it capable of any +explanation which can redeem man from the imputation of unreason? Is +Wisdom even here justified of her children by some deeper law of being? + +The theologian explains it as the unrest of the soul penned in its house +of clay; the physiologist attributes it to the unceasing effort of +organic functions to adapt themselves to ever varying external +conditions. They are both right, for the theologian, were his words +translated into the language of science, refers to the _effort to adapt +condition to function_, which is the peculiar faculty of intelligence, +and which alone renders man unable to accept the comfort of merely +animal existence, an inability which he need never expect to outlive, +for it will increase in exact proportion to his mental development. +Action, not rest, as I have elsewhere said, must be his ideal of life. + +In even his lowest levels man experiences this dissatisfaction. It may +there be confined to a pain he would be free from, or a pleasure he +dreams of. Always the future charms him, and as advancing years increase +the number of his disappointments and bring with them the pains of +decrepitude, he also recurs to the past, when youth was his, and the +world was bright and gay. Thus it comes that most nations speak of some +earlier period of their history as one characterized by purer public +virtues than the present, one when the fires of patriotism burned +brighter and social harmony was more conspicuous. In rude stages of +society this fancy receives real credit and ranks as a veritable record +of the past, forming a Golden Age or Saturnian Era. Turned in the +kaleidoscope of the mythus, it assumes yet more gorgeous hues, and +becomes a state of pure felicity, an Eden or a Paradise, wherein man +dwelt in joy, and from which he wandered or was driven in the old days. + +It is almost needless to quote examples to show the wide distribution of +this myth. The first pages of the Vendidad describe the reign of Yima in +“the garden of delight,” where “there was no cold wind nor violent heat, +no disease and no death.” The northern Buddhist tells of “the land of +joy,” Sukhavati, in the far west, where ruled Amitabha, “infinite +Light.”[175-1] The Edda wistfully recalls the pleasant days of good King +Gudmund who once held sway in Odainsakr, where death came not.[175-2] +Persian story has glad reminiscences of the seven hundred years that +Jemschid sat on the throne of Iran, when peace and plenty were in the +land. + +The garden “eastward in Eden” of the Pentateuch, the land of Tulan or +Tlapallan in Aztec myth, the islands of the Hesperides, the rose garden +of Feridun, and a score of other legends attest with what strong +yearning man seeks in the past the picture of that perfect felicity +which the present never yields. + +Nor can he be persuaded that the golden age has gone, no more to return. +In all conditions of progress, and especially where the load of the +present was the most wearying, has he counted on a restoration to that +past felicity. The paradise lost is to be regained. How it is to be done +the sages are not agreed. But they of old were unanimous that some +divinity must lend his aid, that some god-sent guide is needed to rescue +man from the slough of wretchedness in which he hopelessly struggles. + +Therefore in the new world the red men looked for the ruler who had +governed their happy forefathers in the golden age, and who had not died +but withdrawn mysteriously from view, to return to them, protect them, +and insure them long bliss and ease. The ancient Persians expected as +much from the coming of Craoshanç; the Thibetan Buddhists look to the +advent of a Buddha 5000 years after Sakyamuni, one whose fortunate names +are Maîtrêya, the Loving one, and Adjita, the Unconquerable;[176-1] and +even the practical Roman, as we learn from Virgil, was not a stranger to +this dream. Very many nations felt it quite as strongly as the +Israelites, who from early time awaited a mighty king, the Messiah, the +Anointed, of whom the Targums say: “In his days shall peace be +multiplied;” “He shall execute the judgment of truth and justice on the +earth;” “He shall rule over all kingdoms.” + +The early forms of this conception, such as here referred to, looked +forward to an earthly kingdom, identified with that of the past when +this was vigorous in the national mythology. Material success and the +utmost physical comfort were to characterize it. It was usually to be a +national apotheosis, and was not generally supposed to include the human +race, though traces of this wider view might easily be quoted from +Avestan, Roman, and Israelitic sources. Those who were to enjoy it were +not the dead, but those who shall be living. + +As the myth grew, it coalesced with that of the Epochs of Nature, and +assumed grander proportions. The deliverer was to come at the close of +this epoch, at the end of the world; he was to embrace the whole human +kind in his kingdom; even those who died before his coming, if they had +obeyed his mandates, should rise to join the happy throng; instead of a +mere earthly king, he should be a supernatural visitant, even God +himself; and instead of temporal pleasures only, others of a spiritual +character were to be conferred. There are reasons to believe that even +in this developed form the myth was familiar to the most enlightened +worshippers of ancient Egypt; but it was not till some time after the +doctrines of Christianity had been cast into mythical moulds by the +oriental fancy, that it was introduced in its completed form to modern +thought. Although expressly repudiated by Jesus of Nazareth himself, and +applied in maxim and parable as a universal symbol of intelligence to +the religious growth of the individual and race, his followers reverted +to the coarser and literal meaning, and ever since teach to a greater or +less extent the chiliastic or millennial dogma, often mathematically +computing, in direct defiance of his words, the exact date that event is +to be expected. + +If we ask the psychological construction of this myth, and the ever +present conditions of man’s life which have rendered him always ready to +create it and loath to renounce it, we trace the former distinctly to +his sense of the purposive nature of the laws of thought, and the latter +to the wide difference between desire and fulfilment. His intellectual +nature is framed to accord with laws which are ever present but are not +authoritative; they admonish but they do not coerce; _that_ is done +surely though oft remotely by the consequences of their violation. At +first, unaware of the true character of these laws, he fancies that if +he were altogether comfortable physically, his every wish would be +gratified. Slowly it dawns upon him that no material gratification can +supply an intellectual craving; that this is the real want which haunts +him; and that its only satisfaction is _to think rightly_, to learn the +truth. Then he sees that the millennial kingdom is “not of this world;” +that heaven and earth may pass away, but that such truth as he seeks +cannot pass away; and that his first and only care should be as a +faithful and wise servant to learn and revere it. + +The sentiments which created this mythical cycle, based as they are now +seen to be on ultimate psychological laws, are as active to-day as ever. +This century has witnessed the rise of a school of powerful thinkers and +true philanthropists who maintained that the noblest object is the +securing to our fellow-men the greatest material comfort possible; that +the religious aspirations will do well to content themselves with this +gospel of humanity; and that the approach of the material millennium, +the perfectibility of the human race, the complete adaptation of +function to condition, the “distant but not uncertain final victory of +Good,”[179-1] is susceptible of demonstration. At present, these views +are undergoing modification. It is perceived with more or less +distinctness that complete physical comfort is not enough to make a man +happy; that in proportion as this comfort is attained new wants develope +themselves, quite as importunate, which ask what material comfort +cannot give, and whose demand is neither for utility nor pleasurable +sensation. Such wants are created by the sense of duty and the love of +truth. + +The main difference between the latest exponents of the utilitarian +doctrines and the heralds of distinctively religious thought, is that +the former consider that it is most important in the present condition +of man for him to look after his material welfare; while the latter +teach that if he first subject thought and life to truth and duty, “all +these things will be added unto him.” Wordsworth has cast this latter +opinion, and the myths which are its types, into eloquent verse: + + “Paradise and groves + Elysian, Fortunate Fields--like those of old + Sought in the Atlantic main, why should they be + A history only of departed things, + Or a mere fiction of what never was? + For the discerning intellect of man, + When wedded to this goodly universe + In love and holy passion, shall find these + A simple produce of the common day.” + +The incredulity and even derision with which the latter doctrine is +received by “practical men,” should not affright the collected thinker, +as it certainly is not so chimerical as they pretend. The writer De +Senancourt, not at all of a religious turn, in speculating on the +shortest possible road to general happiness, concluded that if we were +able to foretell the weather a reasonable time ahead, and if men would +make it a rule to speak the truth as near as they can, these two +conditions would remove nine-tenths of the misery in the world. The +more carefully I meditate on this speculation, the better grounded it +seems. The weather we are learning to know much more about than when the +solitary Obermann penned his despondent dreams; but who shall predict +the time when men will tell the truth? + +I now pass to the third great mythical cyclus, which I have called that +of the Hierarchy of the Gods. This was created in order to define that +unknown power which was supposed to give to the wish frustration or +fruition. It includes every statement in reference to the number, +nature, history and character of supernatural beings. + +The precise form under which the intellect, when the religious +conception of unknown power first dawns upon it, imagines this unknown, +is uncertain. Some have maintained that the earliest religions are +animal worships, others that the spirits of ancestors or chiefs are the +primitive gods. Local divinities and personal spirits are found in the +rudest culture, while simple fetichism, or the vague shapes presented by +dreams, play a large part in the most inchoate systems. The prominence +of one or the other of these elements depends upon local and national +momenta, which are a proper study for the science of mythology, but need +not detain us here. The underlying principle in all these conceptions of +divinity is that of the _res per accidens_, an accidental relation of +the thought to the symbol, not a general or necessary one. This is seen +in the nature of these primitive gods. They have no decided character as +propitious or the reverse other than the objects they typify, but are +supposed to send bad or good fortune as they happen to be pleased or +displeased with the votary. No classification as good and evil deities +is as yet perceptible. + +This undeveloped stage of religious thought faded away, as general +conceptions of man and his surroundings arose. Starting always from his +wish dependent on unknown control, man found certain phenomena usually +soothed his fears and favored his wishes, while others interfered with +their attainment and excited his alarm. This distinction, directly +founded on his sensations of pleasure and pain, led to a general, more +or less rigid, classification of the unknown, into two opposing classes +of beings, the one kindly disposed, beneficent, good, the other +untoward, maleficent, evil. + +At first this distinction had in it nothing of a _moral_ character. It +is in fact a long time before this is visible, and to-day but two or +three religions acknowledge it even theoretically. All, however, which +claim historical position set up a dual hierarchy in the divine realms. +Ahura-mazda and Anya-mainyus, God and Satan, Jove and Pluto, Pachacamac +and Supay, Enigorio and Enigohatgea are examples out of hundreds that +might be adduced. + +The fundamental contrast of pleasure and pain might be considered enough +to explain this duality. But in fact it is even farther reaching. The +emotions are dual as well as the sensations, as we have seen in the +first chapter. All the operations of the intellect are dichotomic, and +in mathematical logic must be expressed by an equation of the second +degree. Subject and object must be understood as polar pairs, and in +physical science polarization, contrast of properties corresponding to +contrast of position, is a universal phenomenon. Analogy, therefore, +vindicates the assumption that the unknown, like the known, is the field +of the operation of contradictory powers. + +A variety of expression is given this philosophic notion in myths. In +Egypt, Syria, Greece and India the contrast was that of the sexes, the +male and female principles as displayed in the operations of nature. The +type of all is that very ancient Phrygian cult in which by the side of +Ma, mother of mountains and mistress of herds, stood Papas, father of +the race of shepherds and inventor of the rustic pipe.[183-1] Quite +characteristic was the classification of the gods worshipped by the +miners and metal workers of Phrygian Ida. This was into right and left, +and the general name of Dactyli, Fingers, was given them. The right gods +broke the spells which the left wove, the right pointed out the ore +which the left had buried, the right disclosed the remedies for the +sickness which the left had sent. This venerable division is still +retained when we speak of a _sinister_ portent, or a _right_ judgment. +It is of physiological interest as showing that “dextral pre-eminence” +or right-handedness was prevalent in earliest historic times, though it +is unknown in any lower animal. + +The thoughtful dwellers in Farsistan also developed a religion close to +man’s wants by dividing the gods into those who aid and those who harm +him, subject the one class to Ahura-Mazda, the other to Anya-Mainyus. +Early in their history this assumed almost a moral aspect, and there is +little to be added to one of the most ancient precepts of their +law--“Happiness be to the man who conduces to the happiness of +all.”[184-1] + +When this dual classification sought expression through natural +contrasts, there was one which nigh everywhere offered itself as the +most appropriate. The savage, the nomad, limited to the utmost in +artificial contrivances, met nothing which more signally aided the +accomplishment of his wishes than _light_; nothing which more certainly +frustrated them than _darkness_. From these two sources flow numerous +myths, symbols, and rites, as narratives or acts which convey religious +thought to the eye or the ear of sense. + +As the bringers of light, man adored the sun, the dawn, and fire; +associated with warmth and spring, his further meditations saw in it the +source of his own and of all life, and led him to connect with its +worship that of the reproductive principle. As it comes from above, and +seems to dwell in the far-off sky, he located there his good gods, and +lifted his hands or his eyes when he prayed. As light is necessary to +sight, and as to see is to know, the faculty of knowing was typified as +enlightenment, an inward god-given light. The great and beneficent +deities are always the gods of light. Their names often show this. Deva, +Deus, means the shining one; Michabo, the great white one; the Mongols +call Tien, the chief Turanian god, the bright one, the luminous one; the +northern Buddhist prays to Amitabha, Infinite Light; and the Christian +to the Light of the World. + +On the other hand, darkness was connected with feelings of helplessness +and terror. It exposed him to attacks of wild beasts and all accidents. +It was the precursor of the storm. It was like to death and the grave. +The realm of the departed was supposed to be a land of shadows, an +underground region, an unseeing Hades or hell. + +The task would be easy to show many strange corroborations of these +early chosen symbols by the exacter studies of later ages. Light, as the +indispensable condition of life, is no dream, but a fact; sight is the +highest sentient faculty; and the luminous rays are real intellectual +stimulants.[186-1] But such reflections will not escape the +contemplative reader. + +I hasten to an important consequence of this dual classification of +divinities. It led to what I may call the _quantification of the gods_, +that is, to conceiving divinity under notions of number or quantity, a +step which has led to profound deterioration of the religious sentiment. +I do not mean by this the distinction between polytheism and monotheism. +The latter is as untrue and as injurious as the former, nor does it +contain a whit the more the real elements of religious progress. + +It is indeed singular that this subject has been so misunderstood. Much +has been written by Christian theologians to show the superiority of +monotheisms; and by their opponents much has been made of Comte’s _loi +des trois états_, which defines religious progress to be first +fetichism, secondly polytheism, finally monotheism. Of this Mr. Lewes +says: “The theological system arrived at the highest perfection of which +it is capable when it substituted the providential action of a single +being, for the varied operations of the numerous divinities which had +before been imagined.”[187-1] Nothing could be more erroneous than the +spirit of this statement; nothing is more correct, if the ordinary talk +of the superiority of monotheism in religion be admitted. + +History and long experience show that monotheistic religions have no +special good effect either on the morals or the religious sensibility of +races.[187-2] Buddhism,[187-3] Mohammedanism and Judaism are, at least +in theory, uncompromising monotheisms; modern Christianity is less so, +as many Catholics pray to the Virgin and Saints, and many Protestants to +Christ. So long as _the mathematical conception of number_, whether one +or many, is applied to deity by a theological system, it has not yet +“arrived at the highest perfection of which it is capable.” + +For let us inquire what a monotheism is? It is a belief in one god as +distinct from the belief in several gods. In other words, it applies to +God the mathematical concept of unity, a concept which can only come +into cognition by virtue of contrasts and determinations, and which +forces therefore the believer either to Pantheism or anthropomorphism to +reconcile his belief with his reason. No other resource is left him. +With monotheism there must always be the idea of numerical separateness, +which is incompatible with universal conceptions. + +Let him, however, clear his mind of the current admiration for +monotheisms, and impress upon himself that he who would form a +conception of supreme intelligence must do so under the rules of pure +thought, not numerical relation. The logical, not the mathematical, +unity of the divine is the perfection of theological reasoning. Logical +unity does not demand a determination by contrasts; it conveys only the +idea of identity with self. As the logical attainment of truth is the +recognition of identities in apparent diversity, thus leading from the +logically many to the logically one, the assumption of the latter is +eminently justified. Every act of reasoning is an additional proof of +it.[188-1] + +Nor does the duality of nature and thought, to which I have alluded, in +any wise contradict this. In pure thought we must understand the +dichotomic process to be the distinction of a positive by a privative, +both logical elements of the same thought, as I have elsewhere shown. +The opposites or contraries referred to as giving rise to the dualistic +conceptions of divinity are thus readily harmonized with the conception +of logical unity. This was recognized by the Hindoo sage who composed +the Bhagavad Gità, early in our era. Krishna, the Holy One, addressing +the King Ardjuna says: “All beings fall into error as to the nature of +creation, O Bharata, by reason of that delusion of natural opposites +which springs from liking and disliking, oh thou tormentor of thy +foes!”[189-1] + +The substitution of the conception of mathematical for logical unity in +this connection has left curious traces in both philosophy and religion. +It has led to a belief in the triplicate nature of the supreme Being, +and to those philosophical triads which have often attracted thinkers, +from Pythagoras and Heraclitus down to Hegel and Ghiberti. + +Pythagoras, who had thought profoundly on numbers and their relations, +is credited with the obscure maxim that every thought is made up of a +definite one and an indefinite two (a μονας and an αοριστος δυας). Some +of his commentators have added to rather than lessened the darkness of +this saying. But applied to concrete number, it seems clear enough. Take +any number, ten, for example, and it is ten by virtue of being a _one_, +one ten, and because on either side counting upward or downward, a +different number appears, which two are its logical determinants, but, +as not expressed, make up an _indefinite two_. + +So the number one, thought as concrete unity, is really a trinity, made +up of its definite self and its indefinite next greater and lesser +determinants. The obscure consciousness of this has made itself felt in +many religions when they have progressed to a certain plane of thought. +The ancient Egyptian gods were nearly all triune; Phanes, in the Orphic +hymns the first principle of things, was tripartite; the Indian +trinities are well known; the Celtic triads applied to divine as well as +human existence; the Jews distinguished between Jehovah, his Wisdom and +his Word; and in Christian religion and philosophy the doctrine of the +trinity, though nowhere taught by Christ, has found a lasting foothold, +and often presents itself as an actual tritheism.[190-1] + +The triplicate nature of number, thus alluded to by Pythagoras, springs +from the third law of thought, and holds true of all concrete notions. +Every such notion stands in necessary relation to its privative, and to +the logical concept of next greater extension, _i. e._, that which +includes the notion and its privative, as I explained in the first +chapter. This was noted by the early Platonists, who describe a certain +concrete expression of it as “the intelligential triad;” and it has been +repeatedly commented upon by later philosophers, some of whom avowedly +derive from it the proof of the trinitarian dogma as formulated by +Athanasius. Even modern mathematical investigations have been supposed +to point to a _Deus triformis_, though of course quite another one from +that which ancient Rome honored. A late work of much ability makes the +statement: “The doctrine of the Trinity, or something analogous to it, +forms, as it were, the avenue through which the universe itself leads us +up to the conception of the Infinite and Eternal One.”[191-1] The +explanation of this notion is the same as that of the “Trinity of the +Gentiles,” always hitherto a puzzling mythological concept. + +For reasons previously given, an analysis of the formal law itself does +not yield these elements. They belong to a certain class of values +assigned it, not to the law itself; hence it is only when deity is +conceived under the conditions of numerical oneness that the tripartite +constitution of a whole number makes itself felt, and is applied to the +divine nature. + +The essence of a logical unit is identity, of a mathematical, +difference. The qualities of the latter are limitations--_so much of a +thing_; those of the former are coincidences--_that kind of a thing_. + +To be sure it is no easy matter to free ourselves from the habit of +confounding identity and individuality. We must cultivate a much greater +familiarity with the forms of thought, and the character of universals, +than every-day life requires of us, before the distinction grows facile. +The individual, not the species, exists; our own personality, our +thinking faculty is what we are most certain of. On it rests the reality +of everything, the Unknown as well. But the rejection of a mathematical +unity does not at all depreciate the force of such an argument. +Individuality regarded as mathematical unity rests on the deeper law of +logical identity from which the validity of numbers rises; it is not +the least diminished, but intensified, in the conception of a Supreme +Intelligence, as the font of truth, though the confinements and +limitations of the mathematical unit fall away, and all contrasts +disappear. + +The reverse conception, however, has prevailed in religious systems, +polytheistic or monotheistic. Man has projected on the cloudy unknown +the magnified picture of his own individuality and shuddered with terror +at the self-created plantasm,[TN-9] like the peasant frightened by the +spectre of the Brocken, formed by the distorted image of himself. In his +happier moments, with his hopes gratified, the same vice of thought, +still active, prevented him from conceiving any higher ideal than his +better self. “Everywhere the same tendency was observed; the gods, +always exaggerations of human power and passions, became more and more +personifications of what was most admirable and lovable in human nature, +till in Christianity there emerged the avowed ideal man.” What could it +end in but anthropomorphism, or pantheism, or, rejecting both, a +Religion of Humanity, with a background of an imbecile Unknowable? + +Is it necessary to point out how none of these conclusions can satisfy +the enlightened religious sentiment? How anthropomorphism,which[TN-10] +makes God in the image of man, instead of acknowledging that man is +made in the image of God, belittles divinity to a creature of passions +and caprices? How pantheism, increasing God at the expense of man, wipes +out the fundamental difference of true and false, calls bad “good in the +making,” and virtually extinguishes the sense of duty and the permanence +of personality? And how the denial of all possible knowledge of the +absolute digs away the only foundation on which sanity can establish a +religion, and then palms off material comfort as the proper food for +religious longing? + +The long story of religious effort is not from fetichism to monotheism, +as Comte read it; nor is its only possible goal inside the limits of the +ego, as Feuerbach and the other Neo-Hegelians assert; but it is on its +theoretical side to develope with greater and greater distinctness the +immeasurable reality of pure thought, to dispense more and more with the +quantification of the absolute, and to avoid in the representation of +that Being the use of the technic of concrete existence. + +Little by little we learn that the really true is never true in fact, +that the really good is never good in act.[194-1] Carefully cherishing +this distinction taught by mathematics and ethics, the religious mind +learns to recognize in that only reality darkly seen through the glass +of material things, that which should fix and fill its meditations. +Passing beyond the domain of physical law, it occupies itself with that +which defines the conditions of law. It contemplates an eternal +activity, before which its own self-consciousness seems a flickering +shadow, yet in that contemplation is not lost but gains an evergrowing +personality. + +This is the goal of religious striving, the hidden aim of the wars and +persecutions, the polemics and martyrdoms, which have so busied and +bloodied the world. This satisfies the rational postulates of religion. +Does some one say that it does not stimulate its emotional elements, +that it does not supply the impulses of action which must ever be the +criteria of the true faith? Is it not a religion at all, but a +philosophy, a search, or if you prefer, a love for the truth? + +Let such doubter ponder well the signification of truth, its relation to +life, its identity with the good, and the paramount might of wisdom and +a clear understanding, and he will be ready to exclaim with the +passionate piety of St. Augustine: “_Ubi inveni veritatem, ibi inveni +Deum meum, ipsam veritatem, quam, ex quo didici, non sum oblitus._” + +From this brief review of its character, the Myth will be seen to be one +of the transitory expressions of the religious sentiment, which in +enlightened lands it has already outgrown and should lay aside. So far +as it relates to events, real or alleged, historic or geologic, it deals +with that which is indifferent to pure religion; and so far as it +assumes to reveal the character, plans and temper of divinity, it is too +evidently a reflex of man’s personality to be worthy of serious +refutation where it conflicts with the better guide he has within him. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[156-1] In this definition the word _apperception_ is used in the sense +assigned it by Professor Lazarus--the perception modified by imagination +and memory. “Mythologie ist eine Apperceptionsform der Natur und des +Menschen.” (_Zeitschrift für Völkerpsychologie_, Bd. i., s. 44). Most +recent mythologists omit the latter branch of the definition; for +instance, “A myth is in its origin an explanation by the uncivilized +mind of some natural phenomenon.” (John Fiske, _Myths and Myth Makers_, +p. 21). This is to omit that which gives the myth its only claim to be a +product of the religious sentiment. Schopenhauer, in calling dogmas and +myths “the metaphysics of the people,” fell into the same error. +Religion, as such, is always concrete. + +[159-1] Half a century ago the learned Mr. Faber, in his _Origin of +Pagan Idolatry_, expressed his astonishment at “the singular, minute and +regular accordance” between the classical myths. That accordance has now +been discovered to be world-wide. + +[160-1] “Ganz gleiche Mythen können sehr füglich, jede selbstständig, an +verschiedenen Oerter emporkommen.” _Briefe an Woelcker._ + +[161-1] The last two are the modern orthodox theories, supported by +Bryant, Faber, Trench, De Maistre and Sepp. Medieval Christianity +preferred the direct agency of the Devil. Primitive Christianity leaned +to the opinion that the Grecian and Roman myth makers had stolen from +the sacred writings of the Jews. + +[165-1] Sir Wm. Hamilton, _Lectures on Metaphysics_. Appendix, p. 691. + +[165-2] Creuzer, _Symbolik und Mythologie_, Bd. ii., s. 107. + +[166-1] Th. Nöldeke, _Zeitschrift für Völkerpsychologie_, Bd. iii., s. +131. + +[166-2] See a note of Prof. Spiegel to Yaçna, 29, of the _Khordah-Avesta_. + +[167-1] Ἡ υγρα φυσις αρχη και γενεσις παντων. + + Plutarch, _De Iside_. + +According to the Koran and the Jewish Rabbis, the throne of God rested +on the primeval waters from which the earth was produced. See a note in +Rodwell’s translation of the Koran, _Sura_. xi. + +[167-2] I have discussed some of these myths in the seventh chapter of +the _Myths of the New World_. + +[168-1] How it troubled the early Christians who dared not adopt the +refuge of the Epochs of Nature, may be seen in the _Confessions_ of St. +Augustine, Lib. XI, cap. 10, et seq. He quotes the reply of one pushed +by the inquiry, what God was doing before creation: “He was making a +hell for inquisitive busy-bodies.” _Alta spectantibus gehennas parabat._ + +[170-1] Many interesting references to the Oriental flood-myth may be +found in Cory’s _Ancient Fragments_. See also, Dr. Fr. Windischmann, +_Die Ursagen der Arischen Völker_, pp. 4-10. It is probable that in very +ancient Semitic tradition Adam was represented as the survivor of a +flood anterior to that of Noah. Maimonides relates that the Sabians +believed the world to be eternal, and called Adam “the Prophet of the +Moon,” which symbolized, as we know from other sources, the deity of +water. Rabbi Moses Ben Maimon, _More Nevochim_, cap. iv. In early +Christian symbolism Christ was called “the true Noah”; the dove +accompanied him also, and as through Noah came “salvation by wood and +water,” so through Christ came “salvation by spirit and water.” (See St. +Cyril of Jerusalem’s _Catechetical Lectures_, Lect. xvii., cap. 10). The +fish (ιχθυς) was the symbol of Christ as well as of Oannes. As the +second coming of Christ was to be the destruction of the world, how +plainly appear the germs of the myth of the Epochs of Nature in the +Judæo-Christian mind! + +[171-1] Besides the expressions in the Book of Ecclesiastes and the +later prophets, the doctrine is distinctly announced in one of the most +sublime of the Psalms (xc), one attributed to “Moses the Man of God.” + +[172-1] Malachi, ch. iv., v. 2. + +[175-1] C. F. Koppen, _Die Lamaische Hierarchie_, s. 28. + +[175-2] Odainsakr, ô privative, _dain_ death, _akr_ land, “the land of +immortal life.” Saxo Grammaticus speaks of it also. Another such land +faintly referred to in the Edda is Breidablick, governed by Baldur, the +Light-god. + +[176-1] C. F. Koppen, _Die Lamaische Hierarchie und Kirche_, p. 17. + +[179-1] John Stuart Mill, _Theism_, p. 256. + +[183-1] Creuzer, _Symbolik und Mythologie_, Bd. II., s. 47 + +[184-1] This is the first line of Yaçna, 42, of the _Khordah-Avesta_. +The Parsees believe that it is the salutation which meets the soul of +the good on entering the next world. + +[186-1] “Sight is the light sense. Through it we become acquainted with +universal relations, this being _reason_. Without the eye there would be +no reason.” Lorenz Oken, _Elements of Physio-Philosophy_, p. 475. + +[187-1] _History of Philosophy_, Vol. II. p. 638 (4th ed.) + +[187-2] “The intolerance of almost all religions which have maintained +the unity of God, is as remarkable as the contrary principle in +polytheism.” Hume, _Nat. Hist. of Religion_, Sec. ix. + +[187-3] “The Lamas emphatically maintain monotheism to be the real +character of Buddhism.” Emil Schlagintweit, _Buddhism in Tibet_, p. 108. + +[188-1] No one has seen the error here pointed out, and its injurious +results on thought, more clearly than Comte himself. He is emphatic in +condemning “le tendance involontaire à constituer l’unité spéculative +par l’ascendant universel des plus grossières contemplations numérique, +geométrique ou mécaniques.” _Systême de Politique Positive_; Tome I., p. +51. But he was too biassed to apply this warning to Christian thought. +The conception of the Universe in the logic of Professor De Morgan and +Boole is an example of speculative unity. + +[189-1] _Bhagavad Gità_, ch. iv. + +[190-1] See the introduction by Mr. J. W. Etheridge to _The Targums of +Onkelos and Jonathan Ben Uzziel_ (London, 1862). St. Augustine believed +the trinity is referred to in the opening verses of Genesis. +_Confessiones_, Lib. xiii. cap. 5. The early Christian writer, +Theophilus of Antioch (circa 225), in his _Apologia_, recognizes the +Jewish trinity only. It was a century later that the dogma was defined +in its Athanasian form. See further, Isaac Preston Cory, _Ancient +Fragments, with an Inquiry into the Trinity of the Gentiles_ (London, +1832). + +[191-1] _The Unseen Universe_, p. 194. + +[194-1] “A good will is the only altogether good thing in the +world.”--_Kant._ “What man conceives in himself is always superior to +that reality which it precedes and prepares.”--_Comte._ + + + + +THE CULT, ITS SYMBOLS AND RITES. + + +SUMMARY. + + The Symbol represents the unknown; the Rite is the ceremony of + worship. + + A symbol stands for the supernatural, an emblem for something + known. The elucidation of symbolism is in the laws of the + association of ideas. Associations of similarity give related + symbols, of contiguity coincident symbols. Symbols tend either + toward personification (iconolatry), or toward secularization. The + symbol has no fixed interpretation. Its indefiniteness shown by the + serpent symbol, and the cross. The physiological relations of + certain symbols. Their classification. The Lotus. The Pillar. + Symbols discarded by the higher religious thought. Esthetic and + scientific symbolism (the “Doctrine of Correspondences”). + + Rites are either propitiatory or memorial. The former spring either + from the idea of sacrifice or of specific performance. A sacrifice + is a gift, but its measure is what it costs the giver. Specific + performance means that a religious act should have no ulterior aim. + Vicarious sacrifice and the idea of sin. + + Memorial rites are intended to recall the myth, or else to keep up + the organization. The former are dramatic or imitative, the latter + institutionary. Tendency of memorial rites to become propitiatory. + Examples. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +THE CULT, ITS SYMBOLS AND RITES. + + +As the side which a religious system presents to the intellect is shown +in the Myth, so the side that it presents to sense is exhibited in the +Cult. This includes the representation and forms of worship of the +unknown power which presides over the fruition of the Prayer or +religious wish. The representation is effected by the Symbol, the +worship by the Rite. The development of these two, and their relation to +religious thought, will be the subject of the present chapter. + +The word Symbolism has a technical sense in theological writings, to +wit, the discussion of creeds, quite different from that in which it is +used in mythological science. Here it means the discussion of the +natural objects which have been used to represent to sense supposed +supernatural beings. As some conception of such beings must first be +formed, the symbol is necessarily founded upon the myth, and must be +explained by it. + +A symbol is closely allied to an emblem, the distinction being that the +latter is intended to represent some abstract conception or concrete +fact, not supposed to be supernatural. Thus the serpent is the emblem of +Esculapius, or, abstractly, of the art of healing; but in its use as a +symbol in Christian art it stands for the Evil One, a supernatural +being. The heraldric insignia of the Middle Ages were emblematic +devices; but the architecture of the cathedrals was largely symbolic. +Both agree in aiming to aid the imagination and the memory, and both may +appeal to any special sense, although the majority are addressed to +sight alone. + +Symbolism has not received the scientific treatment which has been so +liberally bestowed on mythology. The first writer who approached it in +the proper spirit was Professor Creuzer.[200-1] Previous to his labors +the distinction between pictographic and symbolic art was not well +defined. He drew the line sharply, and illustrated it abundantly; but he +did not preserve so clearly the relations of the symbol and the myth. +Indeed, he regarded the latter as a symbol, a “phonetic” one, to be +treated by the same processes of analysis. Herein later students have +not consented to follow him. The contrast between these two expressions +of the religious sentiment becomes apparent when we examine their +psychological origin. This Professor Creuzer did not include in his +researches, nor is it dwelt upon at any length in the more recent works +on the subject.[201-1] The neglect to do this has given rise to an +arbitrariness in the interpretation of many symbols, which has often +obscured their position in religious history. + +What these principles are I shall endeavor to indicate; and first of the +laws of the origin of symbols, the rules which guided the early +intellect in choosing from the vast number of objects appealing to sense +those fit to shadow forth the supernatural. + +It may safely be assumed that this was not done capriciously, as the +modern parvenue makes for himself a heraldric device. The simple and +devout intellect of the primitive man imagined a real connection between +the god and the symbol. Were this questioned, yet the wonderful +unanimity with which the same natural objects, the serpent, the bird, +the tree, for example, were everywhere chosen, proves that their +selection was not the work of chance. The constant preference of these +objects points conclusively to some strong and frequent connection of +their images with mythical concepts. + +The question of the origin of symbols therefore resolves itself into one +of the association of ideas, and we start from sure ground in applying +to their interpretation the established canons of association. These, as +I have elsewhere said, are those of contiguity and similarity, the +former producing association by the closeness of succession of +impressions or thoughts, the latter through impressions or thoughts +recalling like ones in previous experience. When the same occurrence +affects different senses simultaneously, or nearly so, the association +is one of _contiguity_, as thunder and lightning, for a sound cannot be +_like_ a sight; when the same sense is affected in such a manner as to +recall a previous impression, the association is one of _similarity_, as +when the red autumn leaves recall the hue of sunset. Nearness in time or +nearness in kind is the condition of association. + +The intensity or permanence of the association depends somewhat on +temperament, but chiefly on repetition or continuance. Not having an ear +for music, I may find it difficult to recall a song from hearing its +tune; but by dint of frequent repetition I learn to associate them. +Light and heat, smoke and fire, poverty and hunger so frequently occur +together, that the one is apt to recall the other. So do a large number +of antithetical associations, as light and darkness, heat and cold, by +_inverse similarity_, opposite impressions reviving each other, in +accordance with the positive and privative elements of a notion. + +This brief reference to the laws of applied thought,--too brief, did I +not take for granted that they are generally familiar--furnishes the +clue to guide us through the labyrinth of symbolism, to wit, the +repeated association of the event or power recorded in the myth with +some sensuous image. Where there is a connection in kind between the +symbol and that for which it stands, there is _related_ symbolism; where +the connection is one of juxtaposition in time, there is _coincident_ +symbolism. Mother Earth, fertile and fecund, was a popular deity in many +nations, and especially among the Egyptians, who worshipped her under +the symbol of a cow; this is related symbolism; the historical event of +the execution of Christ occurred by crucifixion, one of several methods +common in that age, and since then the cross has been the symbol of +Christianity; this is coincident symbolism. It is easy for the two to +merge, as when the cross was identified with a somewhat similar and much +older symbol, one of the class I have called “related,” signifying the +reproductive principle, and became the “tree of life.” As a coincident +symbol is to a certain extent accidental in origin, related symbols +have always been most agreeable to the religious sentiment. + +This remark embodies the explanation of the growth of religious +symbolism, and also its gradual decay into decorative art and mnemonic +design. The tendency of related symbolism is toward the identification +of the symbol with that for which it stands, toward personification or +prosopopeia; while what I may call the _secularization_ of symbols is +brought about by regarding them more and more as accidental connections, +by giving them conventional forms, and treating them as elements of +architectural or pictorial design, or as aids to memory. + +This tendency of related symbolism depends on a law of applied thought +which has lately been formulated by a distinguished logician in the +following words: “What is true of a thing, is true of its like.”[204-1] +The similarity of the symbol to its prototype assumed, the qualities of +the symbol, even those which had no share in deciding its selection, no +likeness to the original, were lumped, and transferred to the divinity. +As those like by similarity, so those unlike, were identified by +contiguity, as traits of the unknown power. This is the active element +in the degeneracy of religious idealism. The cow or the bull, chosen +first as a symbol of creation or fecundity, led to a worship of the +animal itself, and a transfer of its traits, even to its horns, to the +god. In a less repulsive form, the same tendency shows itself in the +pietistic ingenuity of such poets as Adam de Sancto Victore and George +Herbert, who delight in taking some biblical symbol, and developing from +it a score of applications which the original user never dreamt of. In +such hands a chance simile grows to an elaborate myth. + +Correct thought would prevent the extension of the value of the symbol +beyond the original element of similarity. More than this, it would +recognize the fact that similarity does not suppose identity, but the +reverse, to wit, defect of likeness; and this dissimilitude must be the +greater, as the original and symbol are naturally discrepant. The +supernatual,[TN-11] however, whether by this term we mean the unknown or +the universal--still more if we mean the incomprehensible--is utterly +discrepant with the known, except by an indefinitely faint analogy. In +the higher thought, therefore, the symbol loses all trace of identity +and becomes merely emblematic. + +The ancients defended symbolic teaching on this very ground, that the +symbol left so much unexplained, that it stimulated the intellect and +trained it to profounder thinking;[205-1] practically it had the +reverse effect, the symbol being accepted as the thing itself. + +Passing from these general rules of the selection of symbols, to the +history of the symbol when chosen, this presents itself to us in a +reciprocal form, first as the myth led to the adoption and changes in +the symbol, and as the latter in turn altered and reformed the myth. + +The tropes and figures of rhetoric by which the conceptions of the +supernatural were first expressed, give the clue to primitive symbolism. +A very few examples will be sufficient. No one can doubt that the figure +of the serpent was sometimes used in pictorial art to represent the +lightning, when he reads that the Algonkins _straightly_ called the +latter a snake; when he sees the same adjective, spiral or winding, +(ἑλικοιεδης) applied by the Greeks to the lightning and a snake; when +the Quiché call the electric flash a strong serpent; and many other such +examples. The Pueblo Indians represent lightning in their pictographs by +a zigzag line. A zigzag fence is called in the Middle States a worm or +“snake” fence. Besides this, adjectives which describe the line traced +by the serpent in motion are applied to many twisting or winding +objects, as a river, a curl or lock of hair, the tendrils of a vine, the +intestines, a trailing plant, the mazes of a dance, a bracelet, a broken +ray of light, a sickle, a crooked limb, an anfractuous path, the +phallus, etc. Hence the figure of a serpent may, and in fact has been, +used with direct reference to every one of these, as could easily be +shown. How short-sighted then the expounder of symbolism who would +explain the frequent recurrence of the symbol or the myth of the serpent +wherever he finds it by any one of these! + +This narrowness of exposition becomes doubly evident when we give +consideration to two other elements in primitive symbolism--the +multivocal nature of early designs, and the misapprehensions due to +contiguous association. + +To illustrate the first, let us suppose, with Schwarz[207-1] and others, +that the serpent was at first the symbol of the lightning. Its most +natural representation would be in motion; it might then stand for the +other serpentine objects I have mentioned; but once accepted as an +acknowledged symbol, the other qualities and properties of the serpent +would present themselves to the mind, and the effort would be made to +discover or to imagine likenesses to these in the electric flash. The +serpent is venomous; it casts its skin and thus seems to renew its life; +it is said to fascinate its prey; it lives in the ground; it hisses or +rattles when disturbed: none of these properties is present to the mind +of the savage who scratches on the rock a zigzag line to represent the +lightning god. But after-thought brings them up, and the association of +contiguity can apply them all to the lightning, and actually has done so +over and over again; and not only to it, but also to other objects +originally represented by a broken line, for example, the river gods and +the rays of light. + +This complexity is increased by the ambiguous representation of symbolic +designs. The serpent, no longer chosen for its motion alone, will be +expressed in art in that form best suited to the meaning of the symbol +present in the mind of the artist. Realism is never the aim of religious +art. The zigzag line, the coil, the spiral, the circle and the straight +line, are all geometrical radicals of various serpentine forms. Any one +of these may be displayed with fanciful embellishments and artistic +aids. Or the artist, proceeding by synecdoche, takes a part for the +whole, and instead of portraying the entire animal, contents himself +with one prominent feature or one aspect of it. A striking instance of +this has been developed by Dr. Harrison Allen, in the prevalence of what +he calls the “crotalean curve,” in aboriginal American art, a line which +is the radical of the profile view of the head of the rattlesnake +(_crotalus_).[208-1] This he has detected in the architectural monuments +of Mexico and Yucatan, in the Maya phonetic scrip, and even in the rude +efforts of the savage tribes. Each of these elective methods of +representing the serpent, would itself, by independent association, +call up ideas out of all connection whatever with that which the figure +first symbolized. These, in the mind entertaining them, will supersede +and efface the primitive meaning. Thus the circle is used in +conventional symbolic art to designate the serpent; but also the eye, +the ear, the open mouth, the mamma, the sun, the moon, a wheel, the +womb, the vagina, the return of the seasons, time, continued life, hence +health, and many other things. Whichever of these ideas is easiest +recalled will first appear on looking at a circle. The error of those +who have discussed mythological symbolism has been to trace a connection +of such adventitious ideas beyond the symbol to its original meaning; +whereas the symbol itself is the starting-point. To one living in a +region where venomous serpents abound, the figure of one will recall the +sense of danger, the dread of the bite, and the natural hostility we +feel to those who hurt us; whereas no such ideas would occur to the +native of a country where there are no snakes, or where they are +harmless, unless taught this association. + +Few symbols have received more extended study than that of the cross, +owing to its prominence in Christian art. This, as I have said, was +coincident or incidental only. It corresponded, however, to a current +“phonetic symbol,” in the expression common to the Greeks and Romans of +that day, “to take up one’s cross,” meaning to prepare for the worst, a +metaphor used by Christ himself. + +Now there is no agreement as to what was the precise form of the cross +on which he suffered. Three materially unlike crosses are each equally +probable. In symbolic art these have been so multiplied that now _two +hundred and twenty-two_ variants of the figure are described![210-1] Of +course there is nothing easier than to find among these similarities, +with many other conventional symbols, the Egyptian Tau, the Hammer of +Thor, the “Tree of Fertility,” on which the Aztecs nailed their victims, +the crossed lines which are described on Etruscan tombs, or the logs +crossed at rectangles, on which the Muskogee Indians built the sacred +fire. The four cardinal points are so generally objects of worship, that +more than any other mythical conception they have been represented by +cruciform figures. But to connect these in any way with the symbol as it +appears in Christian art, is to violate every scientific principle. + +Each variant of a symbol may give rise to myths quite independent of its +original meaning. A symbol once adopted is preserved by its sacred +character, exists long as a symbol, but with ever fluctuating +significations. It always takes that which is uppermost in the mind of +the votary and the congregation. Hence, psychology, and especially the +psychology of races, is the only true guide in symbolic exegesis. + +Nor is the wide adoption and preservation of symbols alone due to an +easily noticed similarity between certain objects and the earliest +conceptions of the supernatural, or to the preservative power of +religious veneration. + +I have previously referred to the associations of ideas arising from +ancestral reversions of memory, and from the principles of minimum +muscular action and harmonic excitation. Such laws make themselves felt +unconsciously from the commencement of life, with greater or less power, +dependent on the susceptibility of the nervous system. They go far +toward explaining the recurrence and permanence of symbols, whether of +sight or sound. Thus I attribute the prevalence of the serpentine curve +in early religious art largely to its approach to the “line of beauty,” +which is none other than that line which the eye, owing to the +arrangement of its muscles, can follow with the minimum expenditure of +nervous energy. The satisfaction of the mind in viewing symmetrical +figures or harmonious coloring, as also that of the ear, in hearing +accordant sounds, is, as I have remarked, based on the principle of +maximum action with minimum waste. The mind gets the most at the least +cost. + +The equilateral triangle, which is the simplest geometrical figure which +can enclose a space, thus satisfying the mind the easiest of any, is +nigh universal in symbolism. It is seen in the Egyptian pyramids, whose +sides are equilateral triangles with a common apex, in the mediæval +cathedrals, whose designs are combinations of such triangles, in the +sign for the trinity, the pentalpha, etc. + +The classification of some symbols of less extensive prevalence must be +made from their phonetic values. One class was formed as were the +“canting arms” in heraldry, that is, by a rebus. This is in its simpler +form, direct, as when Quetzalcoatl, the mystical hero-god of Atzlan, is +represented by a bird on a serpent, _quetzal_ signifying a bird, _coatl_ +a serpent; or composite, two or more of such rebus symbols being blended +by synecdoche, like the “marshalling” of arms in heraldry, as when the +same god is portrayed by a feathered serpent; or the rebus may occur +with paronymy, especially when the literal meaning of a name of the god +is lost, as when the Algonkins forgot the sense of the word _wabish_, +white or bright, as applied to their chief divinity, and confounding it +with _wabos_, a rabbit, wove various myths about their ancestor, the +Great Hare, and chose the hare or rabbit as a totemic badge.[212-1] + +It is almost needless to add further that the ideas most frequently +associated with the unknown object of religion are those, which, +struggling after material expression, were most fecund in symbols. We +have but to turn to the Orphic hymns, or those of the Vedas or the +Hebrew Psalms, to see how inexhaustible was the poetic fancy, stirred by +religious awe, in the discovery of similitudes, any of which, under +favoring circumstances, might become a symbol. + +Before leaving this branch of my subject, I may illustrate some of the +preceding comments by applying them to one or two well known subjects of +religious art. + +A pleasing symbol, which has played a conspicuous part in many +religions, is the Egyptian lotus, or “lily of the Nile.” It is an +aquatic plant, with white, roseate or blue flowers, which float upon the +water, and send up from their centre long stamens. In Egypt it grows +with the rising of the Nile, and as its appearance was coincident with +that important event, it came to take prominence in the worship of Isis +and Osiris as the symbol of fertility. Their mystical marriage took +place in its blossom. In the technical language of the priests, however, +it bore a profounder meaning, that of the supremacy of reason above +matter, the contrast being between the beautiful flower and the muddy +water which bears it.[214-1] In India the lotus bears other and +manifold meanings. It is a symbol of the sacred river Ganges, and of the +morally pure. No prayer in the world has ever been more frequently +repeated than this: “Om! the jewel in the lotus. Amen” (_om mani padme +hum_). Many millions of times, every hour, for centuries, has this been +iterated by the Buddhists of Thibet and the countries north of it. What +it means, they can only explain by fantastic and mystical guesses. +Probably it refers to the legendary birth of their chief saint, +Avalokitesvara, who is said to have been born of a lotus flower. But +some say it is a piece of symbolism not strange to its meaning in +Egypt,[214-2] and borrowed by Buddhism from the Siva worship. In the +symbolic language of this sect the lotus is the symbol of the vagina, +while the phallus is called “the jewel.” With this interpretation the +Buddhist prayer would refer to the reproductive act; but it is +illustrative of the necessity of attributing wholly diverse meanings to +the same symbol, that the Buddhists neither now nor at any past time +attached any such signification to the expression, and it would be most +discrepant with their doctrines to do so.[214-3] + +Another symbol has frequently been open to this duplicate +interpretation, that is, the upright pillar. The Egyptian obelisk, the +pillars of “Irmin” or of “Roland,” set up now of wood, now of stone by +the ancient Germans, the “red-painted great warpole” of the American +Indians, the May-pole of Old England, the spire of sacred edifices, the +staff planted on the grave, the terminus of the Roman landholders, all +these objects have been interpreted to be symbols of life, or the +life-force. As they were often of wood, the trunk of a tree for +instance, they have often been called by titles equivalent to the “tree +of life,” and are thus connected with the nigh innumerable myths which +relate to some mystic tree as the source of life. The ash Ygdrasyl of +the Edda, the oak of Dordona and of the Druid, the modern Christmas +tree, the sacred banyan, the holy groves, illustrate but faintly the +prevalence of tree worship. Even so late as the time of Canute, it had +to be forbidden in England by royal edict. + +Now, the general meaning of this symbol I take to be the same as that +which led to the choice of hills and “high places,” as sites for altars +and temples, and to the assigning of mountain tops as the abodes of the +chief gods. It is seen in adjectives applied, I believe, in all +languages, certainly all developed ones, to such deities themselves. +These adjectives are related to adverbs of place, signifying _above_, +_up_ or _over_. We speak of the supernatural, or supernal powers, the +Supreme Being, the Most High, He in Heaven, and such like. So do all +Aryan and Semitic tongues. Beyond them, the Chinese name for the Supreme +Deity, Tien, means _up_. I have elsewhere illustrated the same fact in +native American tongues. The association of light and the sky above, the +sun and the heaven, is why we raise our hands and eyes in confident +prayer to divinity. That at times, however, a religion of sex-love did +identify these erect symbols with the phallus as the life-giver, is very +true, but this was a temporary and adventitious meaning assigned a +symbol far more ancient than this form of religion. + +In this review of the principles of religious symbolism, I have +attempted mainly to exhibit the part it has sustained in the development +of the religious sentiment. It has been generally unfavorable to the +growth of higher thought. The symbol, in what it is above the emblem, +assumes more than a similarity, a closer relation than analogy; to some +degree it pretends to a hypostatic union or identity of the material +with the divine, the known to sense with the unknown. Fully seen, this +becomes object worship; partially so, personification. + +There is no exception to this. The refined symbolisms which pass current +to day as religious philosophies exemplify it. The one, esthetic +symbolism, has its field in musical and architectural art, in the study +and portraiture of the beautiful; the other, scientific symbolism, +claims to discover in the morphology of organisms, in the harmonic laws +of physics, and in the processes of the dialectic, the proof that +symbolism, if not a revelation, is at least an unconscious inspiration +of universal truth. This is the “Doctrine of Correspondences,” much in +favor with Swedenborgians, but by no means introduced by the founder of +that sect. The recognition of the identity in form of the fundamental +laws of motion and thought, and the clearer understanding of the +character of harmony which the experiments of Helmholtz and others give +us, disperse most of the mystery about these similarities. The religion +of art, as such, will come up for consideration in the next chapter. + +The second form of the Cult is the Rite. This includes the acts or +ceremonies of worship. Considered in the gross, they can be classed as +of two kinds, the first and earliest propitiatory, the second and later +memorial or institutionary. + +We have but to bear in mind the one aspiration of commencing religious +thought, to wit, the attainment of a wish, to see that whatever action +arose therefrom must be directed to that purpose. Hence, when we analyze +the rude ceremonies of savage cults, the motive is extremely apparent. +They, like their prayers, all point to the securing of some material +advantage. They are designed + + “to cozen + The gods that constrain us and curse.” + +The motives which underlie these simplest as well as the most elaborate +rituals, and impress upon them their distinctively religious character +can be reduced to two, the idea of _sacrifice_ and the idea of _specific +performance_. + +The simplest notion involved in a sacrifice is that of _giving_. The +value of the gift is not, however, the intrinsic worth of the thing +given, nor even the pleasure or advantage the recipient derives +therefrom, but, singularly enough, the amount of pain the giver +experiences in depriving himself of it! This is also often seen in +ordinary transactions. A rich man who subscribes a hundred dollars to a +charity, is thought to merit less commendation than the widow who gives +her mite. Measured by motive, this reasoning is correct. There is a +justice which can be vindicated in holding self-denial to be a standard +of motive. All developed religions have demanded the renunciation of +what is dearest. The Ynglyngasaga tells us that in a time of famine, the +first sacrifice offered to the gods was of beasts only; if this failed, +men were slain to appease them; and if this did not mitigate their +anger, the king himself was obliged to die that they might send plenty. +The Latin writers have handed it down that among the Germans and Gauls a +human sacrifice was deemed the more efficacious the more distinguished +the victim, and the nearer his relationship to him who offered the +rite.[219-1] The slaughter of children and wives to please the gods was +common in many religions, and the self-emasculation of the priests of +Cybele, with other such painful rites, indicates that the measure of the +sacrifice was very usually not what the god needed, but the willingness +of the worshipper to give. + +The second idea, that of _specific performance_, has been well expressed +and humorously commented upon by Hume in his _Natural History of +Religions_. He says: “Here I cannot forbear observing a fact which may +be worth the attention of those who make human nature the object of +their inquiry. It is certain that in every religion, many of the +votaries, perhaps the greatest number, will seek the divine favor, not +by virtue and good morals, but either by frivolous observances, by +intemperate zeal, by rapturous ecstasies, or by the belief of mysterious +and absurd opinions. + +* * * In all this [_i. e._, in virtue and good morals], a superstitious +man finds nothing, which he has properly performed for the sake of his +deity, or which can peculiarly recommend him to divine favor and +protection. * * * * But if he fast or give himself a sound whipping, +this has a direct reference, in his opinion, to the service of God. No +other motive could engage him to such austerities.” + +The philosopher here sets forth in his inimitable style a marked +characteristic of religious acts. But he touches upon it with his usual +superficiality. It is true that no religion has ever been content with +promoting the happiness of man, and that the vast majority of votaries +are always seeking to do something specifically religious, and are not +satisfied with the moral only. The simple explanation of it is that the +religious sentiment has a purpose entirely distinct from ethics, a +purpose constantly felt as something peculiar to itself, though +obscurely seen and often wholly misconceived. It is only when an action +is utterly dissevered from other ends, and is purely and solely +religious, that it can satisfy this sentiment. “_La religion_,” most +truly observes Madame Necker de Saussure, “_ne doit point avoir d’autre +bût qu’elle même_.” + +The uniform prevalence of these ideas in rites may be illustrated from +the simplest or the most elaborate. Father Brebeuf, missionary to the +Hurons in 1636, has a chapter on their superstitions. He there tells us +that this nation had two sorts of ceremonies, the one to induce the +gods to grant good fortune, the other to appease them when some ill-luck +had occurred. Before running a dangerous rapid in their frail canoes +they would lay tobacco on a certain rock where the deity of the rapid +was supposed to reside, and ask for safety in their voyage. They took +tobacco and cast it in the fire, saying: “O Heaven (_Aronhiaté_), see, I +give you something; aid me; cure this sickness of mine.” When one was +drowned or died of cold, a feast was called, and the soft parts of the +corpse were cut from the bones and burned to conciliate the personal +god, while the women danced and chanted a melancholy strain. Here one +sacrifice was to curry favor with the gods, another to soothe their +anger, and the third was a rite, not a sacrifice, but done for a +religious end, whose merit was specific performance. + +As the gift was valued at what it cost the giver, and was supposed to be +efficacious in this same ratio, self-denial soon passed into +self-torture, prolonged fasts, scourging and lacerations, thus becoming +legitimate exhibitions of religious fervor. As mental pain is as keen as +bodily pain, the suffering of Jephthah was quite as severe as that of +the Flagellants, and was expected to find favor in the eyes of the gods. + +A significant corrollary[TN-12] from such a theory follows: that which is +the efficacious part of the sacrifice is the suffering; given a certain +degree of this, the desired effect will follow. As to what or who +suffers, or in what manner he or it suffers, these are secondary +considerations, even unimportant ones, so far as the end to be obtained +is concerned. This is the germ of _vicarious_ sacrifice, a plan +frequently observed in even immature religions. What seems the +diabolical cruelty of some superstitious rites, those of the +Carthaginians and Celts, for example, is thoroughly consistent with the +abstract theory of sacrifice, and did not spring from capricious malice. +The Death of Christ, regarded as a general vicarious atonement, has had +its efficiency explained directly by the theory that the pain he +suffered partook of the infinity of his divine nature; as thus it was +excruciating beyond measure, so it was infinitely effectual toward +appeasing divinity. + +It is well known that this doctrine was no innovation on the religious +sentiment of the age when it was preached by the Greek fathers. For +centuries the Egyptian priests had taught the incarnation and sufferings +of Osiris, and his death for the salvation of his people. Similar myths +were common throughout the Orient, all drawn from the reasoning I have +mentioned.[222-1] + +They have been variously criticized. Apart from the equivocal traits +this theory of atonement attributes to the supernatural powers--a +feature counterbalanced, in modern religion, by subduing its harshest +features--it is rooted essentially in the material view of religion. The +religious value of an act is to be appraised by the extent to which it +follows recognition of duty. To acknowledge an error is unpleasant; to +renounce it still more so, for it breaks a habit; to see our own errors +in their magnitude, sullying our whole nature and reaching far ahead to +generations yet unborn, is consummately bitter, and in proportion as it +is bitter, will keep us from erring.[223-1] This is the “sacrifice of a +contrite heart,” which alone is not despicable; and this no one can do +for us. We may be sure that neither the physical pain of victims burning +in a slow fire, nor the mental pain of yielding up whatever we hold +dearest upon earth, will make our views of duty a particle clearer or +our notion of divinity a jot nobler; and whatever does neither of these +is not of true religion. + +The theory of sacrifice is intimately related with the idea of sin. In +the quotation I have made from Father Brebeuf we see that the Hurons +recognized a distinct form of rite as appropriate to appease a god when +angered. It is a matter of national temperament which of these forms +takes the lead. Joutel tells of a tribe in Texas who paid attention only +to the gods who worked them harm, saying that the good gods were good +anyhow. By parity of reasoning, one sect of Mohammedans worship the +devil only. It is well to make friends with your enemy, and then he will +not hurt you; and if a man is shielded from his enemies, he is safe +enough. + +But where, as in most Semitic, Celtic and various other religions, the +chief gods frowned or smiled as they were propitiated or neglected, and +when a certain amount of pain was the propitiation they demanded, the +necessity of rendering this threw a dark shadow on life. What is the +condition of man, that only through sorrow he can reach joy? He must be +under a curse. + +Physical and mental processes aided by analogy this gloomy deduction. It +is only through pain that we are stimulated to the pursuit of pleasure, +and the latter is a phantom we never catch. The laws of correct +reasoning are those which alone should guide us; but the natural laws of +the association of ideas do not at all correspond with the one +association which reason accepts. Truth is what we are born for, error +is what is given us. + +Instead of viewing this state of things as one inseparable to the +relative as another than the universal, and, instead of seeing the means +of correcting it in the mental element of attention, continuance or +volition, guided by experience and the growing clearness of the purposes +of the laws of thought, the problem was given up as hopeless, and man +was placed under a ban from which a god alone could set him free; he was +sunk in original sin, chained to death. + +To reach this result it is evident that a considerable effort at +reasoning, a peculiar view of the nature of the gods, and a temperament +not the most common, must be combined. Hence it was adopted as a +religious dogma by but a few nations. The Chinese know nothing of the +“sense of sin,” nor did the Greeks and Romans. The Parsees do not +acknowledge it, nor do the American tribes. “To sin,” in their +languages, does not mean to offend the deity, but to make a mistake, to +miss the mark, to loose one’s way as in a wood, and the missionaries +have exceeding difficulty in making them understand the theological +signification of the word. + +The second class of rites are memorial in character. As the former were +addressed to the gods, so these are chiefly for the benefit of the +people. They are didactic, to preserve the myth, or institutionary, to +keep alive the discipline and forms of the church. + +Of this class of rites it may broadly be said they are the myth +dramatized. Indeed, the drama owes its origin to the mimicry by +worshippers of the supposed doings of the gods. The most ancient +festivals have reference to the recurrence of the seasons, and the +ceremonies which mark them represent the mythical transactions which are +supposed to govern the yearly changes. The god himself was often +represented by the + +high priest, and masked figures took the parts of attendant deities. + +Institutionary rites are those avowedly designed to commemorate a myth +or event, and to strengthen thereby the religious organization. +Christian baptism is by some denominations looked upon as a +commemorative or institutionary rite only; and the same is the case with +the Lord’s Supper. These seem to have been the only rites recommended, +though the former was not practiced by Christ. In any ordinary meaning +of his words, he regarded them both as institutionary. + +The tendency of memorial to become propitiatory rites is visible in all +materialistic religions. The procedure, from a simple commemorative act, +acquires a mystic efficacy, a supernatural or spiritual power, often +supposed to extend to the deity as well as the votary. Thus the Indian +“rain-maker” will rattle his gourd, beat his drum, and blow through his +pipe, to represent the thunder, lightning, and wind of the storm; and +he believes that by this mimicry of the rain-god’s proceedings he can +force him to send the wished-for showers. The charms, spells and +incantations of sorcery have the same foundation. Equally visible is it +in the reception of the Christian rites above mentioned, baptism and the +Eucharist, as “sacraments,” as observances of divine efficacy in +themselves. All such views arise from the material character of the +religious wants. + +The conclusion is that, while emblems and memorial rites have nothing in +them which can mar, they also have nothing which can aid the growth and +purity of the religious sentiment, beyond advancing its social +relations; while symbols, in the proper sense of the term, and +propitiatory rites, as necessarily false and without foundation, always +degrade and obscure religious thought. Their prominence in a cult +declines, as it rises in quality; and in a perfected scheme of worship +they would have no place whatever. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[200-1] In his chapter _Ideen zu einer Physik des Symbols und des +Mythus_, of his _Symbolik und Mythologie_. + +[201-1] Dr. H. C. Barlow’s _Essays on Symbolism_ (London, 1866), +deserves mention as one of the best of these. + +[204-1] W. S. Jevons, _The Substitution of Similars_, p. 15 (London, +1869.) + +[205-1] Creuzer, _Symbolik_, Bd. I, s. 59. + +[207-1] _Ursprung der Mythologie_ (Berlin, 1862). + +[208-1] Harrison Allen, M. D., _The Life Form in Art_, Phila. 1874. + +[210-1] Cussans, _Grammar of Heraldry_, p. 16. + +[212-1] Numerous examples from classical antiquity are given by Creuzer, +_Symbolik_, Bd. i. s. 114. sqq. + +[214-1] W. von Humboldt, _Gesammelte Werke_, Bd. iv., s. 332. + +[214-2] Creuzer, _Symbolik und Mythologie_, Bd. i., s. 282. + +[214-3] Carl Frederick Koppen, _Die Lamaische Hierarchie and[TN-13] +Kirche_, ss. 59, 60, 61. + +[219-1] Adolph Holtzmann, _Deutsche Mythologie_, p. 232 (Leipzig, 1874). + +[222-1] “Es ist so gewissermassen in allen ernsten orientalischen Lehren +das Christenthum in seinem Keime vorgebildet.” Creuzer, _Symbolik und +Mythologie der Alten Völker_, Bd. i., s. 297. + +[223-1] In a conversation reported by Mr. John Morley, John Stuart Mill +expressed his belief that “the coming modification of religion” will be +controlled largely through men becoming “more and more impressed with +the awful fact that a piece of conduct to-day may prove a curse to men +and women scores and even hundreds of years after the author of it is +dead.” + + + + +THE MOMENTA OF RELIGIOUS THOUGHT. + + +SUMMARY. + + National impulses and aims as historic ideas. Their recurrence and + its explanation. Their permanence in relation to their truth and + consciousness. The historic ideas in religious progress are chiefly + three. + + I. The Idea of the Perfected Individual. + + First placed in physical strength. This gave way in Southern Europe + to the idea of physical symmetry, a religion of beauty and art. + Later days have produced the idea of mental symmetry, the religion + of culture. All have failed, and why? The momenta of true religion + in each. + + II. The Idea of the Perfected Commonwealth. + + Certain national temperaments predispose to individualism, others + to communism. The social relations governed at first by divine law. + Later, morality represents this law. The religion of conduct. The + religion of sentiment and of humanity. Advantages and disadvantages + in this idea. + + Comparisons of these two ideas as completed respectively by Wilhelm + von Humboldt and Auguste Comte. + + III. The Idea of Personal Survival. + + The doctrine of immortality the main moment in Christianity, Islam + and Buddhism. Unfamiliar to old and simple faiths. Its energy and + speculative relations. It is decreasing as a religious moment owing + to, (1) a better understanding of ethics, (2) more accurate + cosmical conceptions, (3) the clearer defining of life, (4) the + increasing immateriality of religions. + + The future and final moments of religious thought. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +THE MOMENTA OF RELIGIOUS THOUGHT. + + +The records of the past can be studied variously. Events can be arranged +in the order of their occurrence: this is chronology or annals; in +addition to this, their connections and mutual relations as cause and +effect may be shown: this is historical science; or, thirdly, from a +general view of trains of related events some abstract aim as their +final cause may be theoretically deduced and confirmed by experience: +this is the philosophy of history. The doctrine of final causes, in its +old form as the _argumentum de appetitu_, has been superseded. Function +is not purpose; desire comes from the experience of pleasure, and +realizes its dreams, if at all, by the slow development of capacity. The +wish carries no warrant of gratification with it. No “argument from +design” can be adduced from the region where the laws of physical +necessity prevail. Those laws are not designed for an end. + +When, however, in the unfolding of mind we reach the stage of notions, +we observe a growing power to accomplish desire, not only by altering +the individual or race organism, but also by bringing external objects +into unison with the desire, reversing the process common in the life of +sensation. This spectacle, however, is confined to man alone, and man as +guided by prospective volition, that is, by an object ahead. + +When some such object is common to a nation or race, it exercises a wide +influence on its destiny, and is the key to much that otherwise would be +inexplicable in its actions. What we call national hopes, ambitions and +ideals are such objects. Sometimes they are distinctly recognized by the +nation, sometimes they are pursued almost unconsciously. They do not +correspond to things as they are, but as they are wished to be. Hence +there is nothing in them to insure their realization. They are like an +appetite, which may and may not develope the function which can gratify +it. They have been called “historic ideas,” and their consideration is a +leading topic in modern historical science. + +Reason claims the power of criticizing such ideas, and of distinguishing +in them between what is true and therefore obtainable, and what is false +and therefore chimerical or even destructive. This is the province of +the philosophy of history. It guides itself by those general principles +for the pursuit of truth which have been noticed in brief in the earlier +pages of this book. Looking before as well as after, it aspires in the +united light of experience and the laws of mind, to construct for the +race an ideal within the reach of its capacities, yet which will +develope them to the fullest extent, a pole-star to which it can trust +in this night teeming with will-o’-the wisps. + +The opinion that the history of mind is a progress whose end will be +worth more than was its beginning, may not prove true in fact--the +concrete expression never wholly covers the abstract requirements--but +it is undoubtedly true in theory. The progress, so far, has been by no +means a lineal one--each son a better man than his father--nor even, as +some would have it, a spiral one--periodical recurrences to the same +historical ideas, but each recurrence a nearer approach to the +philosophical idea--but it has been far more complex and irregular than +any geometrical figure will illustrate. These facile generalizations do +not express it. + +Following the natural laws of thought man has erred infinitely, and his +errors have worked their sure result--they have destroyed him. There is +no “relish of salvation” in an error; otherwise than that it is sure to +kill him who obstructs the light by harboring it. There is no sort of +convertability of the false into the true, as shallow thinkers of the +day teach. + +Man has only escaped death when at first by a lucky chance, and then by +personal and inherited experience, his thoughts drifted or were forced +into conformity with the logical laws of thought. + +A historic idea is a complex product formed of numerous conceptions, +some true and others false. Its permanency and efficacy are in direct +proportion to the number and clearness of the former it embraces. When +it is purging itself of the latter, the nation is progressive; when the +false are retained, their poison spreads and the nation decays. + +The _periodical recurrence_ of historic ideas is one of their most +striking features. The explanations offered for it have been various. +The ancient doctrines of an exact repetition of events in the cycles of +nature, and of the transmigration of souls, drew much support from it; +and the modern modification of the latter theory as set forth by +Wordsworth and Lessing, are distinctly derived from the same source. +Rightly elucidated, the philosophical historian will find in it an +invaluable clue to the unravelment of the tangled skein of human +endeavor. + +Historic periodicity is on the one side an organic law of memory, +dependent upon the revival of transmitted ancestral impressions. A +prevailing idea though over-cultivation exhausts its organic correlate, +and leads to defective nutrition of that part in the offspring. Hence +they do not pursue the same idea as their fathers, but revert to a +remoter ancestral historic idea, the organic correlate of which has +lain fallow, thus gained strength. It is brought forth as new, receives +additions by contiguity and similarity, is ardently pursued, +over-cultivated, and in time supplanted by another revival. + +But this material side corresponds to an all-important mental one. As an +organic process only, the history of periodic ideas is thus +satisfactorily explained, but he who holds this explanation to be +exhaustive sees but half the problem. + +The permanence of a historic idea, I have stated, is in direct +proportion to the number of true ideas in its composition; the +impression it makes on the organic substrata of memory is in turn in +proportion to its permanence. The element of decay is the destructive +effects of natural trains of thought out of accord with the logically +true trains. These cause defective cerebral nutrition, which is thus +seen to arise, so far as influenced by the operations of the memory, +from relations of truth and error. There is a physiological tendency in +the former to preserve and maintain in activity; in the latter to +disappear. The percentage of true concepts which makes up the complexity +of a historic idea gives the principal factor towards calculating its +probable recurrence. Of course, a second factor is the physiological one +of nutrition itself. + +The next important distinction in discussing historic ideas is between +those which are held consciously, and those which operate +unconsciously. The former are always found to be more active, and more +amenable to correction. An unconscious idea is a product of the natural, +not the logical laws of mind, and is therefore very apt to be largely +false. It is always displaced with advantage by a conscious aim. + +One of the superficial fallacies of the day, which pass under the name +of philosophy, is to maintain that any such historic idea is the best +possible one for the time and place in which it is found. I am led to +refer to this by the false light it has thrown on religious history. +Herbert Spencer remarks in one of his essays:[236-1] “All religious +creeds, during the eras in which they are severally held, are the best +that could be held.” “All are good for their times and places.” So far +from this being the case, there never has been a religion but that an +improvement in it would have straightway exerted a beneficent effect. +Man, no matter what his condition, can always derive immediate good +from higher conceptions of Deity than he himself has elaborated. Nor is +the highest conception possible an idealization of self, as I have +sufficiently shown in a previous chapter, but is one drawn wholly from +the realm of the abstract. Moreover, as a matter of history, we know +that in abundant instances, the decay of nations can be traced largely +to the base teachings of their religious instructors. To maintain that +such religions were “the best possible ones” for the time and place is +the absurdest optimism. In what a religion shares of the abstractly true +it is beneficent; in what it partakes of the untrue it is deleterious. +This, and no other canon, must be our guide. + +The ideas of religious history obey the same laws as other historic +ideas. They grow, decay, are supplanted and revive again in varying +guises, in accordance with the processes of organic nutrition as +influenced by the truth or falsity of their component ideas. Their +tendency to personification is stronger, because of the much greater +nearness they have to the individual desire. The one aspiration of a +high-spirited people when subjugated will be freedom; and in the lower +stages of culture they will be very certain to fabricate a myth of a +deliverer to come. + +In like manner, every member of a community shares with his fellow +members some wish, hope or ambition dependent on unknown control and +therefore religious in character, which will become the “formative idea” +of the national religious development. + +Of the various ideas in religious history there are three which, through +their permanence and frequent revival, we may justly suppose in +accordance with the above-mentioned canons to contain a large measure of +truth, and yet to be far from wholly true. They may be considered as +leading moments in religious growth, yet withal lacking something or +other essential to the satisfaction of the religious sentiment. The +first of these is the idea of the _perfected individual_; the second the +idea of the _perfected commonwealth_; the third, that of _personal +survival_. These have been the formative ideas (_Ideen der Gestaltung_) +in the prayers, myths, rites and religious institutions of many nations +at widely separated times. + +Of the two first mentioned it may be said that every extended faith has +accepted them to some degree. They are the secret of the alliances of +religion with art, with government, with ethics, with science, education +and sentiment. + +These alliances have often been taken by historians to contain the vital +elements of religion itself, and many explanations based on one or +another assumption of the kind have been proffered. Religion, while it +may embrace any of them, is independent of them all. Its relations to +them have been transitory, and the more so as their aims have been +local and material. The brief duration of the subjection of religion to +such incongenial ties was well compared by Lord Herbert of Cherbury to +the early maturity of brutes, who attain their full growth in a year or +two, while man needs a quarter of a century.[239-1] The inferior aims of +the religious sentiment were discarded one after another to make way for +higher ones, which were slowly dawning upon it. In this progress it was +guided largely by the three ideas I have mentioned, which have been in +many forms leading stimuli of the religious thought of the race. + +First, of the _idea of the perfected individual_. + +Many writers have supposed that the contemplation of Power in nature +first stirred religious thought in man. Though this is not the view +taken in this book, no one will question that the leading trait in the +gods of barbarism is physical strength. The naive anthropomorphism of +the savage makes his a god of a mighty arm, a giant in stature, puissant +and terrible. He hurls the thunderbolt, and piles up the mountains in +sport. His name is often The Strong One, as in the Allah, Eloah of the +Semitic tongues. Hercules, Chon, Melkarth, Dorsanes, Thor and others +were of the most ancient divinities in Greece, Egypt, Phœnicia, India, +and Scandinavia, and were all embodiments of physical force. Such, too, +was largely the character of the Algonkin Messou, who scooped out the +great lakes with his hands and tore up the largest trees by the roots. +The huge boulders from the glacial epoch which are scattered over their +country are the pebbles he tossed in play or in anger. The cleft in the +Andes, through which flows the river Funha, was opened by a single blow +of Nemqueteba, chief god of the Muyscas. In all such and a hundred +similar legends, easy to quote, we see the notion of strength, brute +force, muscular power, was that deemed most appropriate to divinity, and +that which he who would be godlike must most sedulously seek. When +filled with the god, the votary felt a surpassing vigor. The Berserker +fury was found in the wilds of America and Africa, as well as among the +Fiords. Sickness and weakness, on the contrary, were signs that the gods +were against him. Therefore, in all early stages of culture, the office +of priest and physician was one. Conciliation of the gods was the +catholicon. + +Such deities were fearful to behold. They are represented as mighty of +stature and terrible of mien, calculated to appal, not attract, to +inspire fear, not to kindle love. In tropical America, in Egypt, in +Thibet, almost where you will, there is little to please the eye in the +pictures and statues of deities. + +In Greece alone, a national temperament, marvellously sensitive to +symmetry, developed the combination of maximum strength with perfect +form in the sun-god, Apollo, and of grace with beauty in Aphrodite. The +Greeks were the apostles of the religion of beauty. Their philosophic +thought saw the permanent in the Form, which outlives strength, and is +that alone in which the race has being. In its transmission love is the +agent, and Aphrodite, unmatched in beauty and mother of love, was a +creation worthy of their devotion. Thus with them the religious +sentiment still sought its satisfaction in the individual, not indeed in +the muscle, but in the feature and expression. + +When the old gods fell, the Christian fathers taught their flocks to +abhor the beautiful as one with the sensual. St. Clement of Alexandria +and Tertullian describe Christ as ugly of visage and undersized, a sort +of Socrates in appearance.[241-1] Christian art was long in getting +recognition. The heathens were the first to represent in picture and +statues Christ and the apostles, and for long the fathers of the church +opposed the multiplication of such images, saying that the inward beauty +was alone desirable. Christian art reached its highest inspiration under +the influence of Greek culture after the fall of Constantinople. In the +very year, however, that Rafaello Sanzio met his premature death, Luther +burned the decretals of the pope in the market-place of Wittenberg, and +preached a doctrine as hostile to art as was that of Eusebius and +Chrysostom. There was no longer any hope for the religion of beauty. + +Nevertheless, under the influence of the revival of ancient art which +arose with Winckelmann towards the close of the last century, a gospel +of esthetics was preached. Its apostles were chiefly Germans, and among +them Schiller and Goethe are not inconspicuous names. The latter, before +his long life was closed, began to see the emptiness of such teachings, +and the violence perpetrated on the mind by forcing on the religious +sentiment the food fit only for the esthetic emotions. + +The highest conception of individual perfection is reached in a +character whose physical and mental powers are symmetrically trained, +and always directed by conscious reason to their appropriate ends. +Self-government, founded on self-knowledge, wards off the pangs of +disappointment by limiting ambition to the attainable. The affections +and emotions, and the pleasures of sensation as well, are indulged in or +abstained from, but never to the darkening of the intellect. All the +talents are placed at usury; every power exercised systematically and +fruitfully with a consecration to a noble purpose. + +This is the religion of culture. None other ranks among its adherents so +many great minds; men, as Carlyle expresses it, of much religiosity, if +of little religion. The ideal is a taking one. Such utter self-reliance, +not from ignorance, but from the perfection of knowledge, was that which +Buddha held up to his followers: “Self is the God of self; who else +should be the God?” In this century Goethe, Wordsworth, beyond all +others Wilhelm von Humboldt, have set forth this ideal. Less strongly +intellectual natures, as Maine de Biran, De Senancourt, and Matthew +Arnold, listen with admiration, but feel how unknown to the mass of +human kind must remain the tongue these masters speak. + +Thus did the religious sentiment seek its satisfaction in the +idealization, first of physical force, then of form, and last of mental +force, but in each case turned away unsatisfied. Wherein did these +ideals fail? The first mentioned in exalting power over principle, might +over right. As was well said by the philosophical Novalis: “The ideal of +morality has no more dangerous rival than the ideal of physical +strength, of the most vigorous life. Through it man is transformed into +a reasoning beast, whose brutal cleverness has a fascination for weak +minds.”[243-1] The religion of beauty failed in that it addressed the +esthetic emotions, not the reasoning power. Art does not promote the +good; it owes no fealty to either utility or ethics: in itself, it must +be, in the negative sense of the words, at once useless and immoral. +“Nature is not its standard, nor is truth its chief end.”[244-1] Its +spirit is repose, “the perfect form in perfect rest;” whereas the spirit +of religion is action because of imperfection. Even the gods must know +of suffering, and partake, in incarnations, of the miseries of men. + +In the religion of culture what can we blame? That it is lacking in the +impulses of action through the isolation it fosters; that it is and must +be limited to a few, for it provides no defense for the weaknesses the +many inherit; that its tendency is antagonistic to religion, as it cuts +away the feeling of dependence, and the trust in the unknown; that it +allows too little to enthusiasm ever to become a power. + +On the other hand, what momenta of true religious thought have these +ideals embraced? Each presents some. Physical vigor, regarded as a sign +of complete nutrition, is an indispensable preliminary to the highest +religion. Correct thought cannot be, without sufficient and appropriate +food. If the nourishment is inadequate, defective energy of the brain +will be transmitted, and the offspring will revert ancestrally to a +lower plane of thought. “It thus happens that the minds of persons of +high religious culture by ancestral descent, and the intermarriage of +religious families, so strangely end in the production of children +totally devoid of moral sense and religious sentiment--moral imbeciles +in short.”[245-1] From such considerations of the necessity of physical +vigor to elevated thought, Descartes predicted that if the human race +ever attain perfection it will be chiefly through the art of medicine. +Not alone from emotions of sympathy did the eminent religious teachers +of past ages maintain that the alleviation and prevention of suffering +is the first practical duty of man; but it was from a perhaps +unconscious perception of the antagonism of bodily degeneration to +mental progress. + +So, too, the religion of beauty and art contains an indefeasible germ of +true religious thought. Art sees the universal in the isolated fact; it +redeemed the coarse symbol of earlier days by associating it with the +emotions of joy, instead of fear; commencing with an exaltation of the +love to sex, it etherealized and ennobled passion; it taught man to look +elsewhere than to material things for his highest pleasure, for the work +of art always has its fortune in the imagination and not in the senses +of the observer; conceptions of order and harmony are familiar to it; +its best efforts seek to bring all the affairs of life under unity and +system;[246-1] and thus it strengthens the sentiment of moral +government, which is the first postulate of religion. + +The symmetry of the individual, as understood in the religion of +culture, is likewise a cherished article of true religion. Thus only can +it protect personality against the pitfalls of self-negation and +absorption, which communism and pantheism dig for it. The integrity and +permanence of the person is the keystone to religion, as it is to +philosophy and ethics. None but a false teacher would measure our duty +to our neighbor by a higher standard than our love to ourselves. The +love of God alone is worthy to obscure it. + +Professor Steinthal has said: “Every people has its own religion. The +national temperament hears the tidings and interprets them as it +can.”[246-2] On the other hand, Humboldt--perhaps the profoundest +thinker on these subjects of his generation--doubted whether religions +can be measured in reference to nations and sects, because “religion is +altogether subjective, and rests solely on the conceptive powers of the +individual.”[247-1] Whatever the creed, a pure mind will attach itself +to its better elements, a base one to its brutal and narrow doctrines. A +national religion can only be regarded as an average, applicable to the +majority, not entirely correct of the belief of any one individual, +wholly incorrect as to a few. Yet it is indubitable that the national +temperament creates the ideal which gives the essence of religion. Races +like the Tartar Mongols, who, as we are informed by the Abbé Huc, not +unfrequently move their tents several times a day, out of simple +restlessness, cannot desire the same stability that is sought by other +races, who have the beaver’s instinct for building and colonizing, such +as the Romans. Buddhism, which sets up the ideal of the individual, is +an acceptable theory to the former, while the latter, from earliest +ages, fostered religious views which taught the subordination of the +individual to the community, in other words, the _idea of the perfected +commonwealth_. + +This is the conception at the base of all theocracies, forms of +government whose statutes are identified with the precepts of religion. +Instead of a constitution there is the Law, given and sanctioned by God +as a rule of action. + +The Law is at first the Myth applied. Its object is as much to +propitiate the gods as to preserve social order. It is absolute because +it is inspired. Many of its ordinances as drawn from the myth are +inapplicable to man, and are unjust or frivolous. Yet such as it is, it +rules the conduct of the commonwealth and expresses the ideal of its +perfected condition. + +All the oldest codes of laws are religious, and are alleged revelations. +The Pentateuch, the Avesta, the Laws of Manu, the Twelve Tables, the +Laws of Seleucus, all carry the endorsement, “And God said.” Their real +intention is to teach the relation of man to God, rather than the +relations of man to man. On practical points--on the rights of property, +on succession and wills, on contracts, on the adoption of neighbors, and +on the treatment of enemies--they often violate the plainest dictates of +natural justice, of common humanity, even of family affection. Their +precepts are frequently frivolous, sometimes grossly immoral. But if +these laws are compared with the earliest myths and cults, and the +opinions then entertained of the gods, and how to propitiate them, it +becomes easy to see how the precepts of the law flowed from these +inchoate imaginings of the religious sentiment.[249-1] + +The improvement of civil statutes did not come through religion. +Experience, observation and free thought taught man justice, and his +kindlier emotions were educated by the desire to cherish and preserve +which arose from family and social ties. As these came to be recognized +as necessary relations of society, religion appropriated them, +incorporated them into her ideal, and even claimed them as her +revelations. History largely invalidates this claim. The moral progress +of mankind has been mainly apart from dogmatic teachings, often in +conflict with them. An established rule of faith may enforce obedience +to its statutes, but can never develop morals. “True virtue is +independent of every religion, and incompatible with any which is +accepted on authority.”[249-2] + +Yet thinkers, even the best of them, appear to have had difficulty in +discerning any nobler arena for the religious sentiment than the social +one. “Religion,” says Matthew Arnold, “is conduct.” It is the power +“which makes for righteousness.” “As civil law,” said Voltaire, +“enforces morality in public, so the use of religion is to compel it in +private life.” “A complete morality,” observes a contemporary Christian +writer, “meets all the practical ends of religion.”[250-1] In such +expressions man’s social relations, his duty to his neighbor, are taken +to exhaust religion. It is still the idea of the commonwealth, the +religion of morality, the submission to a law recognized as divine. +Whether the law is a code of ethics, the decision of a general council, +or the ten commandments, it is alike held to be written by the finger of +God, and imperative. Good works are the demands of such religion. + +Catholicism, which is altogether theocratic and authoritative, which +pictures the church as an ideal commonwealth, has always most flourished +in those countries where the Roman colonies left their more important +traces. The reformation of Protestantism was a reversion to the ideal of +the individual, which was that of ancient Teutonic faith. In more recent +times Catholicism itself has modified the rigidity of its teachings in +favor of the religion of sentiment, as it has been called, inaugurated +by Chateaubriand, and which is that attractive form seen in the writings +of Madame Swetchine and the La Ferronnais. These elevated souls throw a +charm around the immolation of self, which the egotism of the Protestant +rarely matches. + +Thus the ideal of the commonwealth is found in those creeds which give +prominence to law, to ethics, and to sentiment, the altruistic elements +of mind. It fails, because its authority is antagonistic to morality in +that it impedes the search for the true. Neither is morality religion, +for it deals with the relative, while religion should guide itself by +the absolute. Every great religious teacher has violated the morality of +his day. Even sentiment, attractive as it is, is no ground on which to +build a church. It is, at best, one of the lower emotional planes of +action. Love itself, which must be the kernel of every true religion, is +not in earthly relations an altruistic sentiment. The measure and the +source of all such love, is self-love. The creed which rejects this as +its corner stone will build in vain. + +While, therefore, the advantages of organization and action are on the +side of the faiths which see in religion a form of government, they +present fewer momenta of religious thought than those which encourage +the greater individuality. All forms and reforms, remarks Machiavelli, +in one of his notes to Livy, have been brought about by the exertions of +one man.[251-1] Religious reforms, especially, never have originated in +majorities. The reformatory decrees of the Council of Trent are due to +Martin Luther. + +Either ideal, raised to its maximum, not only fails to satisfy the +religious sentiment, but puts upon it a forced meaning, and is therefore +not what this sentiment asks. This may be illustrated by comparing two +remarkable works, which, by a singular coincidence, were published in +the same year, and which better than any others present these ideals +pushed to their extreme. It is characteristic of them that neither +professes to treat of religion, but of politics. The one is entitled, +“_An Attempt to define the limits of Government_,” and is by Wilhelm von +Humboldt; the other is the better known work of Auguste Comte, his +“_System of Positive Polity_.”[252-1] + +The first lays down the principle that the highest end of man is the +utmost symmetrical education of his own powers in their individual +peculiarities. To accomplish this, he must enjoy the largest freedom of +thought and action consistent with the recognition of the same right in +others. In regard to religion, the state should have nothing to do with +aiding it, but should protect the individual in his opposition to any +authoritative form of it. As a wholly personal and subjective matter, +social relations do not concern it. In fine, the aim of both government +and education should be the development of an individualism in which an +enlightened intellect controls and directs all the powers toward an +exalted self-cultivation. + +Comte reverses this picture. His fundamental principle is to subordinate +the sum total of our existence to our social relations; real life is to +live in others; not the individual but humanity is the only worthy +object of effort. Social polity therefore includes the whole of +development; the intellect should have no other end but to subserve the +needs of the race, and always be second to the altruistic sentiments. +Love toward others should absorb self-love. “_Il est encore meilleur +d’aimer que d’être aimé._” + +Such is the contrast between the ideal of the individual as exhibited by +the Religion of Culture, and the ideal of the commonwealth as portrayed +in the Religion of Humanity. + +The whole duty of man, says the one school, is to live for others; nay, +says the other, it is to live intelligently for himself; the intellect, +says the former, should always be subordinated to society, and be led by +the emotions; intellect, says the latter, should ever be in the +ascendant, and absolutely control and direct the emotions; the +theoretical object of government, says the former, is to enable the +affections and thoughts to pass into action; not so, says the latter, +its only use is to give the individual secure leisure to develope his +own affections and thoughts. Mutual relation is the key note of the +former, independence of the latter; the former is the apotheosis of +love, the latter of reason. + +Strictly and literally the apotheosis. For, differing as they do on such +vital points, they both agree in dispensing with the ideas of God and +immortality as conceptions superfluous in the realization of the +theoretical perfection they contemplate. Not that either scheme omits +the religious sentiment. On the contrary, it is especially prominent in +one, and very well marked in the other. Both assume its growing +prominence, never its extinction. Both speak of it as an integral part +of man’s highest nature. + +Comte and Humboldt were thinkers too profound to be caught by the facile +fallacy that the rapid changes in religious thought betoken the early +abrogation of all creeds. Lessing, the philosophers of the French +revolution, James Mill, Schopenhauer and others fell into this error. +They were not wiser than the clown of Horace, who seated himself by the +rushing stream, thinking it must soon run itself out-- + + Expectat rusticus dum defluat amnis; at ille + Labitur et labetur in omne volubilis ævum. + +Vain is the dream that man will ever reach the point when he will think +no more of the gods. Dogmas may disappear, but religion will flourish; +destroy the temple and sow it with salt, in a few days it rises again +built for aye on the solid ground of man’s nature. + +So long as the race is upon earth, just so long will the religious +sentiment continue to crave its appropriate food, and this at last is +recognized even by those who estimate it at the lowest. “To yield this +sentiment reasonable satisfaction,” observes Professor Tyndall in one of +his best known addresses, “is the problem of problems at the present +hour. It is vain to oppose it with a view to its extirpation.” The +“general thaw of theological creeds,” which Spencer remarks upon, is no +sign of the loss of interest in religious subjects, but the reverse. +Coldness and languor are the premonitions of death, not strife and +defence. + +But as the two moments of religious thought which I have now discussed +have both reached their culmination in a substantial repudiation of +religion, that which stimulates the religious sentiment to-day must be +something different from either. This I take to be the _idea of personal +survival_ after physical death, or, as it is generally called, the +doctrine of the immortality of the soul. + +This is the main dogma in the leading religions of the world to-day. “A +God,” remarks Sir William Hamilton, speaking for the enlightened +Christians of his generation, “is to us of practical interest, only +inasmuch as he is the condition of our immortality.”[256-1] In his +attractive work, _La Vie Eternelle_, whose large popularity shows it to +express the prevailing views of modern Protestant thought, Ernest +Naville takes pains to distinguish that Christianity is not a means of +living a holy life so much as one of gaining a blessed hereafter. The +promises of a life after death are numerous and distinct in the New +Testament. Most of the recommendations of action and suffering in this +world are based on the doctrine of compensation in the world to come. + +Mohammed taught the same tenet with equal or even greater emphasis. In +one sura he says: “To whatever is evil may they be likened who believe +not in a future life;” and elsewhere: “As for the blessed ones--their +place is Paradise. There shall they dwell so long as the heavens and the +earth endure, enjoying the imperishable bounties of God. But as for +those who shall be consigned to misery, their place is the Fire. There +shall they abide so long as the heavens and the earth shall last, unless +God wills it otherwise.”[256-2] + +In Buddhism, as generally understood, the doctrine of a future life is +just as clear. Not only does the soul wander from one to another animal +body, but when it has completed its peregrinations and reaches its final +abode, it revels in all sorts of bliss. For the condition of Nirvana, +understood by philosophical Buddhists as that of the extinction of +desires even to the desire of life, and of the complete enlightenment of +the mind even to the recognition that existence itself is an illusion, +has no such meaning to the millions who profess themselves the followers +of the sage of Kapilavastu. They take it to be a material Paradise with +pleasures as real as those painted by Mohammed, wherein they will dwell +beyond all time, a reward for their devotions and faith in this life. + +These three religions embrace three-fourths of the human race and all +its civilized nations, with trifling exceptions. They displaced and +extinguished the older creeds and in a few centuries controlled the +earth; but as against each other their strife has been of little avail. +The reason is, they share the same momentum of religious thought, +differing in its interpretation not more among themselves than do +orthodox members of either faith in their own fold. Many enlightened +Muslims and Christians, for example, consider the descriptions of +Paradise given in the Koran and the Apocalypse to convey wholly +spiritual meanings. + +There has been so much to surprise in the rapid extension of these +faiths that the votaries of each claim manifest miraculous +interposition. The religious idea of an after life is a sufficient +moment to account for the phenomenon. I say the _religious_ idea, for, +with one or two exceptions, however distinct had been the belief in a +hereafter, that belief had not a religious coloring until they gave it +such. This distinction is an important one. + +Students of religions have hitherto attributed too much weight to the +primitive notion of an existence after death. It is common enough, but +it rarely has anything at all to do with the simpler manifestations of +the religious sentiment. These are directed to the immediate desires of +the individual or the community, and do not look beyond the present +life. The doctrine of compensation hereafter is foreign to them. I have +shown this at length so far as the religions of America were concerned. +“Neither the delights of a heaven on the one hand, nor the terrors of a +hell on the other were ever held out by priests or sages as an incentive +to well doing, or a warning to the evil disposed.”[258-1] The same is +true of the classical religions of Greece and Rome, of Carthage and +Assyria. Even in Egypt the manner of death and the rites of interment +had much more to do with the fate of the soul, than had its thoughts +and deeds in the flesh. The opinions of Socrates and Plato on the soul +as something which always existed and whose after life is affected by +its experiences here, struck the Athenians as novel and innovating. + +On the other hand, the ancient Germans had a most lively faith in the +life hereafter. Money was loaned in this world to be repaid in the next. +But with them also, as with the Aztecs, the future was dependent on the +character or mode of death rather than the conduct of life. He who died +the “straw-death” on the couch of sickness looked for little joy in the +hereafter; but he who met the “spear-death” on the field of battle went +at once to Odin, to the hall of Valhalla, where the heroes of all time +assembled to fight, eat boar’s fat and drink beer. Even this rude belief +gave them such an ascendancy over the materialistic Romans, that these +distinctly felt that in the long run they must succumb to a bravery +which rested on such a mighty moment as this.[259-1] + +The Israelites do not seem to have entertained any general opinion on an +existence after death. No promise in the Old Testament refers to a +future life. The religion there taught nowhere looks beyond the grave. +It is materialistic to the fullest extent. Hence, a large body of +orthodox Jewish philosophers, the Sadducees, denied the existence of the +soul apart from the body. + +The central doctrine of the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, the leading +impulse which he gave to the religious thought of his age, was that the +thinking part of man survives his physical death, and that its condition +does not depend on the rites of interment, as other religions then +taught,[260-1] but on the character of its thoughts during life here. +Filled with this new and sublime idea, he developed it in its numerous +applications, and drew from it those startling inferences, which, to +this day, stagger his followers, and have been in turn, the terror and +derision of his foes. This he saw, that against a mind inwardly +penetrated with the full conviction of a life hereafter, obtainable +under known conditions, the powers of this world are utterly futile, and +its pleasures hollow phantoms. + +The practical energy of this doctrine was immensely strengthened by +another, which is found very obscurely, if at all, stated in his own +words, but which was made the central point of their teaching by his +immediate followers. The Christianity they preached was not a +philosophical scheme for improving the race, but rested on the +historical fact of a transaction between God and man, and while they +conceded everlasting existence to all men, all would pass it in the +utmost conceivable misery, except those who had learned of these +historical events, and understood them as the church prescribed. + +As the ancient world placed truth in ideas and not in facts, no teaching +could well have been more radically contrary to its modes of thought; +and the doctrine once accepted, the spirit of proselytizing came with +it. + +I have called this idea a new one to the first century of our era, and +so it was in Europe and Syria. But in India, Sakyamuni, probably five +hundred years before, had laid down in sententious maxims the +philosophical principle which underlies the higher religious doctrine of +a future life. These are his words, and if through the efforts of +reasoning we ever reach a demonstration of the immortality of the soul, +we shall do it by pursuing the argument here indicated: “Right thought +is the path to life everlasting. Those who think do not die.”[262-1] + +Truth alone contains the elements of indefinite continuity; and truth is +found only in the idea, in correct thought. + +Error in the intellectual processes corresponds to pain in sensation; it +is the premonition of waning life, of threatened annihilation; it +contains the seed of cessation of action or death. False reasoning is +self-destructive. The man who believes himself invulnerable will +scarcely survive his first combat. A man’s true ideas are the most he +can hope, and all that he should wish, to carry with him to a life +hereafter. Falsehood, sin, is the efficient agent of death. As Bishop +Hall says: “There is a kind of not-being in sin; for sin is not an +existence of somewhat that is, but a deficiency of that rectitude which +should be; it is a privation, as blindness is a privation of sight.” + +While the religious doctrine of personal survival has thus a position +defensible on grounds of reason as being that of the inherent permanence +of self-conscious truth, it also calls to its aid and indefinitely +elevates the most powerful of all the emotions, _love_. This, as I have +shown in the second chapter, is the sentiment which is characteristic +of _preservative_ acts. Self-love, which is prominent in the idea of the +perfected individual, sex-love, which is the spirit of the multiform +religious symbolism of the reproductive act, and the love of race, which +is the chief motor in the religion of humanity, are purified of their +grosser demands and assigned each its meet post in the labor of uniting +the conceptions of the true under the relation of personality. + +The highest development of which such love is capable arises through the +contemplation of those verities which are abstract and eternal, and +which thus set forth, to the extent the individual mind is capable of +receiving it, the completed notion of diuturnity. This highest love is +the “love of God.” A Supreme Intelligence, one to which all truth is +perfect, must forever dwell in such contemplation. Therefore the deeper +minds of Christianity define man’s love of God, as God’s love to +himself. “Eternal life,” says Ernest Naville, “is in its principle the +union with God and the joy that results from that union.”[263-1] The +pious William Law wrote: “No man can reach God with his love, or have +union with Him by it, but he who is inspired with that one same spirit +of love, with which God loved himself from all eternity, before there +was any creation.”[264-1] + +Attractive as the idea of personal survival is in itself, and potent as +it has been as a moment of religious thought, it must be ranked among +those that are past. While the immortality of the soul retains its +interest as a speculative inquiry, I venture to believe that as an idea +in religious history, it is nigh inoperative; that as an element in +devotional life it is of not much weight; and that it will gradually +become less so, as the real meaning of religion reaches clearer +interpretations. + +Its decay has been progressive, and common to all the creeds which +taught it as a cardinal doctrine, though most marked in Christianity. A +century ago Gibbon wrote: “The ancient Christians were animated by a +contempt for their present existence, and by a just confidence of +immortality, of which the doubtful but imperfect faith of modern ages +cannot give us any adequate notion.”[264-2] How true this is can be +appreciated only by those who study this doctrine in the lives and +writings of the martyrs and fathers of the primitive church. + +The breach which Gibbon remarked has been indefinitely widened since his +time. What has brought this about, and what new moment in religious +thought seems about to supply its place, will form an appropriate close +to the present series of studies. In its examination, I shall speak only +of Christian thought, since it leads the way which other systems will +ultimately follow. + +In depicting the influences which have led and are daily leading with +augmented force to the devitalizing of the doctrine of immortality, I +may with propriety confine myself to those which are themselves strictly +religious. For the change I refer to is not one brought about by the +opponents of religion, by materialistic doctrines, but is owing to the +development of the religious sentiment itself. Instead of tending to an +abrogation of that sentiment, it may be expected to ennoble its +emotional manifestations and elevate its intellectual conceptions. + +Some of these influences are historical, as the repeated disappointments +in the second coming of Christ, and the interest of proselytizing +churches to interpret this event allegorically. Those which I deem of +more importance, however, are such as are efficient to-day, and probably +will continue to be the main agents in the immediate future of religious +development. They are: + +(1.) The recognition of the grounds of ethics. + +(2.) The recognition of the cosmical relations. + +(3.) The clearer defining of life. + +(4.) The growing immateriality of religious thought. + +(1.) The authority of the Law was assumed in the course of time by most +Christian churches, and the interests of morality and religion were +claimed to be identical. The Roman church with its developed casuistry +is ready to prescribe the proper course of conduct in every emergency; +and if we turn to many theological writers of other churches, Dick’s +_Philosophy of Religion_ for instance, we find moral conduct regarded as +the important aim of the Christian life. Morality without religion, +works without faith, are pronounced to be of no avail in a religious, +and of very questionable value in a social sense. Some go so far as to +deny that a person indifferent to the prevailing tenets of religion can +lead a pure and moral life. Do away with the belief in a hereafter of +rewards and punishments, say these, and there is nothing left to +restrain men from the worst excesses, or at least from private sin. + +Now, however, the world is growing to perceive that morality is +separable from religion; that it arose independently, from a gradual +study of the relations of man to man, from principles of equity inherent +in the laws of thought, and from considerations of expediency which +deprive its precepts of the character of universality. Religion is +subjective, and that in which it exerts an influence on morality is not +its contents, but the reception of them peculiar to the individual. +Experience alone has taught man morals; pain and pleasure are the forms +of its admonitions; and each generation sees more clearly that the +principles of ethics are based on immutable physical laws. Moreover, it +has been shown to be dangerous to rest morality on the doctrine of a +future life; for apart from the small effect the terrors of a hereafter +have on many sinners, as that doctrine is frequently rejected, social +interests suffer. And, finally, it is debasing and hurtful to religion +to make it a substitute for police magistracy.[267-1] + +The highest religion would certainly enforce the purest morality; but it +is equally true that such a religion would enjoin much not approved by +the current opinions of the day. The spirit of the reform inaugurated by +Luther was a protest against the subjection of the religious sentiment +to a moral code. With the independence thus achieved, it came to be +recognized that to the full extent that morality is essential to +religion, it can be reached as well or better without a system of +rewards and punishments after death, than with one. Both religion and +morality stand higher, when a conception of an after life for this +purpose is dropped. + +(2.) The recognition of the cosmical relations has also modified the +views of personal survival. The expansion of the notions of space and +time by the sciences of geology and astronomy has, as I before remarked, +done away with the ancient belief that the culminating catastrophe of +the universe will be the destruction of this world. An insignificant +satellite of a third rate sun, which, with the far grander suns whose +light we dimly discern at night, may all be swept away in some flurry of +“cosmical weather,” that the formation or the dissolution of such a body +would be an event of any beyond the most insignificant importance, is +now known to be almost ridiculous. To assert that at the end of a few or +a few thousand years, on account of events transpiring on the surface of +this planet, the whole relationship of the universe will be altered, a +new heaven and a new earth be formed, and all therein be made +subservient to the joys of man, becomes an indication of an arrogance +which deserves to be called a symptom of insanity. Thus, much of the +teleology both of the individual and the race taught by the primitive +and medieval church undergoes serious alterations. The literal meaning +of the millennium, the New Jerusalem, and the reign of God on earth has +been practically discarded. + +With the disappearance of the ancient opinion that the universe was +created for man, the sun to light him by day and the stars by night, +disappeared also the later thesis that the happiness or the education of +man was the aim of the Order in Things. The extent and duration of +matter, if they indicate any purpose at all, suggest one incomparably +vaster than this; while the laws of mind, which alone distinctly point +to purpose, reveal one in which pain and pleasure have no part or lot, +and one in which man has so small a share that it seems as if it must be +indifferent what his fate may be. The slightest change in the atmosphere +of the globe will sweep away his species forever. + +Schopenhauer classified all religions as optimisms or pessimisms. The +faith of the future will be neither. What is agreeable or disagreeable +to man will not be its standard of the excellence of the universe. +However unwillingly, he is at last brought to confess that his comfort +is not the chief nor even any visible aim of the order in things. In the +course of that order it may be, nay, it is nigh certain, that the human +species will pass through decadence to extinction along with so many +other organisms. Neither as individuals nor as a race, neither in regard +to this life nor to the next, does the idea of God, when ennobled by a +contemplation of the cosmical relations, permit to man the effrontery +of claiming that this universe and all that therein is was made with an +eye to his wants and wishes, whether to gratify or to defeat them. + +(3.) The closer defining of life as a result of physical force, and the +recognition of mind as a connotation of organism, promise to be active +in elevating religious conceptions, but at the expense of the current +notions of personality. Sensation and voluntary motion are common to the +fetus, the brute and the plant, as well as to man. They are not part of +his “soul.” Intellect and consciousness, as I have shown, exclude +sensation, and in these, if anywhere, he must look for his immortal +part. Even here, error works destruction, and ignorance plants no seed +of life. We are driven back to the teaching of Buddha, that true thought +alone is that which does not die. + +Why should we ask more? What else is worth saving? Our present +personality is a train of ideas base and noble, true and false, coherent +through the contiguity of organs nourished from a common center. Another +personality is possible, one of true ideas coherent through conscious +similarity, independent of sensation, as dealing with topics not +commensurate with it. Yet were this refuge gained, it leaves not much of +the dogma that every man has an indestructible conscious soul, which +will endure always, no matter what his conduct or thoughts have been. +Rather does it favor the opinion expressed so well by Matthew Arnold in +one of his sonnets: + + “He who flagged not in the earthly strife + From strength to strength advancing--only he, + His soul well knit and all his battles won, + Mounts, and that hardly, to eternal life.” + +Not only has the received doctrine of a “soul,” as an undying something +different from mind and peculiar to man, received no support from a +closer study of nature,--rather objections amounting to refutation,--but +it has reacted injuriously on morals, and through them on religion +itself. Buddha taught that the same spark of immortality exists in man +and brute, and actuated by this belief laid down the merciful rule to +his disciples: “Do harm to no breathing thing.” The apostle Paul on the +other hand, recognizing in the lower animals no such claim on our +sympathy, asks with scorn: “Doth God care for oxen?” and actually strips +from a humane provision of the old Mosaic code its spirit of charity, in +order to make it subserve a point in his polemic. + +(4.) As the arrogance of the race has thus met a rebuke, so has the +egotism of the individual. His religion at first was a means of securing +material benefits; then a way to a joyous existence beyond the tomb: the +love of self all the time in the ascendant. + +This egoism in the doctrine of personal survival has been repeatedly +flung at it by satirists, and commented on by philosophers. The +Christian who “hopes to be saved by grossly believing” has been felt on +all hands to be as mean in his hope, as he is contemptible in his way of +attaining it. To center all our religious efforts to the one end of +getting joy--however we may define it--for our individual selves, has +something repulsive in it to a deeply religious mind. Yet that such in +the real significance of the doctrine of personal survival is granted by +its ablest defenders. “The general expectation of future happiness can +afford satisfaction only as it is a present object to the principle of +self-love,” says Dr. Butler, the eminent Lord Bishop of Durham, than +whom no acuter analyst has written on the religious nature of man. + +Yet nothing is more certain than that the spirit of true religion wages +constant war with the predominance or even presence of selfish aims. +Self-love is the first and rudest form of the instinct of preservation. +It is sublimed and sacrificed on the altar of holy passion. “Self,” +exclaims the fervid William Law, “is both atheist and idolater; atheist, +because it rejects God; idolater, because it is its own idol.” Even when +this lowest expression of the preservative instinct rises but to the +height of sex-love, it renounces self, and rejoices in martyrdom. “All +for love, or the world well lost,” has been the motto of too many +tragedies to be doubted now. By the side of the ancient Roman or the +soldier of the French revolution, who through mere love of country +marched joyously to certain death from which he expected no waking, does +not the martyr compare unfavorably, who meets the same death, but does +so because he believes that thereby he secures endless and joyous life? +Is his love as real, as noble, as unselfish? + +Even the resistless physical energy which the clear faith in the life +hereafter has so often imparted, becomes something uncongenial to the +ripened religious meditation. Such faith brings about mighty effects in +the arena of man’s struggles, but it does so through a sort of +mechanical action. An ulterior purpose is ahead, to wit, the salvation +of the soul, and it may be regarded as one of the best established +principles of human effort that every business is better done, when it +is done for its own sake, out of liking for it, than for results +expected from it. + +Of nothing is this more just than religion. Those blossoms of spiritual +perfection, the purified reason, the submissive will, the sanctifying +grace of abstract ideas, find no propitious airs amid the violent toil +for personal survival, whether that is to be among the mead jugs of +Valhalla, the dark-eyed houris of Paradise, or the “solemn troops and +sweet society” of Christian dreams. Unmindful of these, the saintly +psyche looks to nothing beyond truth; it asks no definite, still less +personal, end to which this truth is to be applied; to find it is to +love it, and to love it is enough. + +The doctrine I here broach, is no strange one to Christian thought. To +be sure the exhortation, “Save your soul from Hell,” was almost the sole +incentive to religion in the middle ages, and is still the burden of +most sermons. But St. Paul was quickened with a holier fire, that +consumed and swept away such a personal motive, when he wrote: “Yea, I +could wish that I myself were cast out from Christ as accursed, for the +sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh.”[274-1] St. +Augustine reveals the touch of the same inspiration in his passionate +exclamation: “Far, O Lord, far from the heart of thy servant be it that +I should rejoice in any joy whatever. The blessed life is the joy in +truth alone.”[274-2] And amid the pæans to everlasting life which fill +the pages of the _De Imitatione Christi_, the medieval monk saw +something yet greater, when he puts in the mouth of God the Father, the +warning: “The wise lover thinks not of the gift, but of the love of the +giver. He rests not in the reward, but in Me, beyond all +rewards.”[275-1] The mystery of great godliness is, that he who has it +is as one who seeking nothing yet finds all things, who asking naught +for his own sake, neither in the life here nor yet hereafter, gains that +alone which is of worth in either. + +Pressed by such considerations, the pious Schleiermacher threw down the +glaive on the side of religion half a century ago when he wrote: “Life +to come, as popularly conceived, is the last enemy which speculative +criticism has to encounter, and, if possible, to overcome.” The course +he marked out, however, was not that which promises success. Recurring +to the austere theses of Spinoza, he sought to bring them into accord +with a religion of emotion. The result was a refined Pantheism with its +usual deceptive solutions. + +What recourse is left? Where are we to look for the intellectual moment +of religion in the future? Let us review the situation. + +The religious sentiment has been shown to be the expression of +unfulfilled desire, but this desire peculiar as dependent on unknown +power. Material advantages do not gratify it, nor even spiritual joy +when regarded as a personal sentiment. Preservation by and through +relation with absolute intelligence has appeared to be the meaning of +that “love of God” which alone yields it satisfaction. Even this is +severed from its received doctrinal sense by the recognition of the +speculative as above the numerical unity of that intelligence, and the +limitation of personality which spiritual thought demands. The eternal +laws of mind guarantee perpetuity to the extent they are obeyed--and no +farther. They differ from the laws of force in that they convey a +message which cannot be doubted concerning the purport of the order in +nature, which is itself “the will of God.” That message in its +application is the same which with more or less articulate utterance +every religion speaks--Seek truth: do good. Faith in that message, +confidence in and willing submission to that order, this is all the +religious sentiment needs to bring forth its sweetest flowers, its +richest fruits. + +Such is the ample and satisfying ground which remains for the religion +of the future to build upon. It is a result long foreseen by the clearer +minds of Christendom. One who more than any other deserves to be classed +among these writes: “Resignation to the will of God is the whole of +piety. * * * Our resignation may be said to be perfect when we rest in +his will as our end, as being itself most just and right and good. +Neither is this at bottom anything more than faith, and honesty and +fairness of mind; in a more enlarged sense, indeed, than these words are +commonly used.”[277-1] + +Goethe, who studied and reflected on religious questions more than is +generally supposed, saw that in such a disposition of mind lie the +native and strongest elements of religion. In one of his conversations +with Chancellor Müller, he observed: “Confidence and resignation, the +sense of subjection to a higher will which rules the course of events +but which we do not fully comprehend, are the fundamental principles of +every better religion.”[277-2] + +By the side of two such remarkable men, I might place the opinion of a +third not less eminent than they--Blaise Pascal. In one part of his +writings he sets forth the “marks of a true religion.” Sifted from its +physical ingredients, the faith he defines is one which rests on love +and submission to God, and a clear recognition of the nature of man. + +Here I close these studies on the Religious Sentiment. They show it to +be a late and probably a final development of mind. The intellect first +reaches entire self-consciousness, the emotions first attain perfection +of purpose, when guided by its highest manifestation. Man’s history +seems largely to have been a series of efforts to give it satisfaction. +This will be possible only when he rises to a practical appreciation of +the identity of truth, love and life. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[236-1] _Essay on the use of Anthropomorphism._ Mr. Spencer’s argument, +in his own words, is this:--“From the inability under which we labor to +conceive of a Deity save as some idealization of ourselves, it +inevitably results that in each age, among each people, and to a great +extent in each individual, there must arise just that conception of +Deity best adapted to the needs of the case.” “All are good for their +times and places.” “All were beneficent in their effects on those who +held them.” It would be hard to quote from the records of theory-making +an example of more complete indifference to acknowledged facts than +these quotations set forth. + +[239-1] _De Veritate_, p. 216. + +[241-1] August Neander, _Geschichte der Christlichen Religion und +Kirche_, Bd. i., ss. 160, 346. (Gotha, 1856.) St. Clement’s description +of Christ is Τον οψιν αισχρον. Tertullian says: “Nec humanæ honestatis +corpus fuit, nedum celestis claritatis.” + +[243-1] Novalis, _Schriften_, B. i., s. 244. + +[244-1] A. Bain, _The Senses and the Intellect_, p. 607. + +[245-1] Dr. T. Laycock, _On some Organic Laws of Memory_, in the +_Journal of Mental Science_, July, 1875, p. 178. + +[246-1] Speaking of the mission of the artist, Wilhelm von Humboldt +says: “Die ganze Natur, treu und vollständig beobachtet, mit sich +hinüber zu tragen, d. h. den Stoff seiner Erfahrungen dem Umfange der +Welt gleich zu machen, diese ungeheure Masse einzelner und abgerissener +Erscheinungen in eine l’ungetrennte Einheit und ein organisirtes Ganzes +zu verwandeln; und dies durch alle die Organe zu thun, die ihm hierzu +verliehen sind,--ist das letzte Ziel seines intellectuellen Bemühen.” +_Ueber Goethe’s Hermann und Dorothea_, Ab. IV. + +[246-2] _Zeitschrift für Völkerpsychologie_, B. I. s. 48. + +[247-1] _Gesammelte Werke_. Bd. VII., s. 63. + +[249-1] See this forcibly brought out and abundantly illustrated in the +work of M. Coulange, _La Cité Antique_. + +[249-2] W. von Humboldt, _Gesammelte Werke_. Bd. VII., p. 72. + +[250-1] H. L. Liddon, Canon of St. Paul’s. _Some Elements of Religion_, +p. 84. + +[251-1] The Chevalier Bunsen completed the moral estimate of the +one-man-power, thus acknowledged by Machiavelli, in these words: “Alles +Grosse geht aus vom Einzelnen, _aber nur in dem Masse, als dieser das +Ich dem Ganzen opfert_.” _Gott in der Geschichte_, Bd. I., s. 38. + +[252-1] W. von Humboldt, _Ideen zu einem Vorsuch, die Gränzen der +Wirksamkeit des Staats zu bestimmen_, Breslau, 1851. Auguste Comte, +_Système de Politique Positive_, Paris, 1851-4. The former was written +many years before its publication. + +[256-1] _Lectures on Metaphysics_, Vol. I., p. 23. + +[256-2] _The Koran_, Suras xi., xvi. + +[258-1] _The Myths of the New World_, Chap. IX. + +[259-1] Jacob Grimm quite overlooked this important element in the +religion of the ancient Germans. It is ably set forth by Adolf +Holtzmann, _Deutsche Mythologie_, s. 196 sqq. (Leipzig, 1874). + +[260-1] The seemingly heartless reply he made to one of his disciples, +who asked permission to perform the funeral rites at his father’s grave: +“Follow me; and let the dead bury their dead,” is an obvious +condemnation of one of the most widespread superstitions of the ancient +world. So, according to an ingenious suggestion of Lord Herbert of +Cherbury, was the fifth commandment of Moses: “Ne parentum seriem +tanquam primam aliquam causam suspicerent homines, et proinde cultum +aliquem Divinum illis deferrent, qualem ex honore parentum sperare +liceat benedictionem, docuit.” _De Veritate_, p. 231. + +Herbert Spencer in his _Essay on the Origin of Animal Worship_, calls +ancestral worship “the universal first form of religious belief.” This +is very far from correct, but it is easy to see how a hasty thinker +would be led into the error by the prominence of the ancient funereal +ceremonies. + +[262-1] Dhammapada, 21. + +[263-1] _La Vie Eternelle_, p. 339. + +[264-1] _The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_, Vol. I., ch. XV. + +[264-2] _Address to the Clergy_, p. 16. + +[267-1] “Toute religion, qu’on se permet de défendre comme une croyance +qu’il est utile de laisser au peuple, ne peut plus espérer qu’une agonie +plus ou moins prolongée.” Condorcet, _De l’Esprit Humain_, Ep. V. + +[274-1] _Romans_, ch. ix., v. 3. + +[274-2] “Beata quippe vita est gaudium de veritate.” Augustini +_Confessionum_, Lib. x., caps. xxii., xxiii. + +[275-1] “Prudens amator non tam donum amantis considerat, quam dantis +amorem. Nobilis amator non quiescit in dono, sed in me super omne +donum.” _De Imitatione Christi_, Lib. iii., cap. vi. + +[277-1] _Fifteen Sermons_ by Joseph Butler, Lord Bishop of Durham. +Sermon “On the love of God.” + +[277-2] _Unterhaltungen_, p. 131. + + + + +INDICES. + + +I. AUTHORS QUOTED. + + Allen, H., 208. + + Anaxagoras, 106. + + Arnold, M., 249, 271. + + Aristotle, 105. + + Augustine, St., 20, 57, 93, 128, 191, 194, 274. + + + Bain, A., 9, 25, 52, 59, 87, 91, 244. + + Barlow, H. C., 201. + + Baxter, Richard, 60. + + Boehmer, H., 7. + + Boole, Geo., 24, 44, 104, 105, 108, 111. + + Bunsen, 109, 251. + + Butler, Bishop, 60, 119, 276. + + + Carlyle, 243. + + Catlow, J. P., 14, 64. + + Chateaubriand, 250. + + Comte, A., 11, 39, 128, 187, 194, 252. + + Condorcet, 267. + + Cory, J. P., 191. + + Coulange, 245. + + Creuzer, 90, 106, 119, 127, 200, 212, 222. + + Cussans, 210. + + + Dante, 93. + + Darwin, C., 71, 88. + + Dick, 266. + + Dickson, J. T., 73. + + + Etheridge, J. W., 190. + + + Ferguson, 66. + + Ferrier, J. F., 20, 28, 43, 97. + + Feuchtersleben, 8, 54, 73. + + Feuerbach, 194. + + Fothergill, J. M., 61. + + + Gibbon, 264. + + Goethe, 277. + + Gurney, J. J., 119. + + + Hall, Bishop, 50, 77. + + Hamilton, Sir W., 24, 29, 91, 95, 99, 256. + + Helmholtz, 11, 14, 18, 22. + + Hegel, 29, 88. + + Herbert of Cherbury, 149, 260. + + Hobbes, 81. + + Hodgson, S. N., 104, 126, 128, 134. + + Holtzmann, A., 259. + + Humboldt, A. von, 92. + + Humboldt, W. von, 6, 53, 67, 93, 112, 113, 214, 246, 252. + + Hume, David, 81, 187, 219. + + Hunter, John, 9. + + + Jacobi, 88. + + Jevons, W. S., 25, 204. + + Kant, I., 25, 29, 32, 40, 91, 105, 194. + + + Kolk, Schroeder van der, 72. + + Kitto, 74. + + Koppen, 37, 214. + + + Law, Wm., 49, 87, 263, 272. + + Laycock, 75, 245. + + Lessing, 56, 254. + + Lewes, 187. + + Liddon, H. L., 129, 250. + + + Mansel, 87, 88. + + Maudsley, H., 9, 150. + + Mill, J. S., 18, 87, 91, 97, 223. + + Mohammed, 71, 75, 114, 256. + + Morell, J. D., 88. + + Morley, J., 223. + + Müller, 130. + + Müller, Max, _preface_. + + + Naville, E., 256, 263. + + Neander, A., 241. + + Novalis, 41, 49, 107, 124, 243. + + + Oersted, 103. + + Oken, L., 7, 186. + + + Paget, J., 63. + + Parker, Theo., 88. + + Pascal, 56. + + Plath, 129. + + Rousseau, J. J., 118. + + Saussure, Necker de, 220. + + Schlagintweit, E., 187. + + Schleiermacher, 88, 275. + + Schoolcraft, 63, 146. + + Schopenhauer, A., 11, 13, 51, 82, 91, 269. + + Schwarz, 207. + + Senancourt de, 53, 180. + + Spinoza, 9, 14, 17, 41, 42, 51, 98, 104. + + Spencer, Herbert, 29, 39, 98, 104, 236, 260. + + Swedenborg, 75. + + Steinthal, 101, 246. + + Tertullian, 241. + + Theophilus, 191. + + Thompson, 31. + + Todhunter, 25. + + Tyndall, 87, 132, 255. + + Voltaire, 249. + + Westropp, 62. + + Wigan, A. L., 76. + + Williams, J., 76. + + Wordsworth, 41, 42, 180. + + Windelband, Dr., 101, 102, 108. + + + II. SUBJECTS. + + Absolute, the, 102, 106. + consciousness of, 161. + + Adam, as prophet of the moon, 170. + + Adjita, 178. + + Adonis, 165. + + Aeon, 163, 166. + + Agdistis, an epicene deity, 65. + + Ahura-Mazda, 113, 166, 184. + + Allah, 239. + + Amitabha, 175, 185. + + Analytic propositions, 32. + + Androgynous deities, 66. + + Animism, 163. + + Anointed, the, 176. + + Anya-Mainyus, 166, 184. + + Anthropomorphism, 193. + + Antinomies, of Kant, 29. + + Aphrodite, 65, 241. + + Apocalypse, the, 171. + + Apollo, 67, 241. + + Apperception, 156. + + Apprehension, 142. + + Arab idea of time, 165. + + Argumentum de appetitu, 231. + + Aronhiate, a Huron deity, 221. + + Arrenothele deities, 66. + + Art, religious, in Orient, 15; + in Greece, 16; + Christian, 209, 241; + useless and immoral, 244. + + Assyria, flood myth of, 169. + + Athanasius, his doctrine of the Trinity, 191. + + Atonement, doctrine of, 222. + + Avalokitesvara, 214. + + Aztecs, 80. + + + Baghavad Gita, the, 189. + + Babylon, rites of, 74. + + Baldur, 176. + + Baptism, 138, 226. + + Beauty, the line of, 15, 211. + the religion of, 241, 244, 245. + + Belief, its kinds, 141. + + Brahma, 65, 169. + + Brahmans, highest bliss of, 57; + doctrines, 168, 169. + + Breidablick, 176. + + Brutes, religious feeling in, 88. + + Buddha, 37, 57, 80, 120, 146, 156, 261, 271. + + Buddhism, four truths of, 13; + theories of prayer, 121, 150, 214; + last day, 169; + myths, 175, 176; + monotheism of, 187, 247, 256. + + Bull, as a symbol, 204. + + + Cabala, Jehova in, 65. + + Canting arms, 212. + + Cause, not a reason, 38; + in physical science, 91. + + Celibacy, Romish, 61. + + Cerebration, unconscious, 149. + + Chance, the idea of, 93. + + Chinese character for prayer, 129. + + Christ, _see_ Jesus. + + Christianity, doctrines of, 190, 257, 264, 274; + symbol of, 203. + + Christmas tree, the, 215. + + Cockatrice, the, 77. + + Commonwealth, ideal of, 247. + + Consciousness, forms of, 17, 20. + + Confucius, doctrine, 122, sq. + + Continuity, law of, 11, 16; + principle of, 95. + + Contradiction, law of, 27, 102. + + Correspondences, doctrine of, 217. + + Cosmical relations of man, 112, 268. + + Cotytto, 65. + + Cow, as a symbol, 204. + + Craoshanç, 176. + + Creation, myth of, 166. + + Crescent, a phallic symbol, 62. + + Cross, a phallic symbol, 62; + as phonetic symbol, 210; + variants of, 210. + + Cult, the, 199 sq. + + Culture, religion of, 243, 244, 253. + + Cybele, 65; priests of, 66, 219. + + + Dactyli, the, 184. + + Darkness, terror of, 185. + + Day of Judgment, the, 172. + + Deity, _see_ God. + + Design, argument from, 110. + + Desire, meaning of, 53. + + Deus, 185; triformis, 191. + + Deva, 185. + + Didactic rites, 225. + + Divination and prayer, 137. + + Dramatic rites, 226. + + Dual law of thought, 27, 102; + division of the gods, 182, 183. + + + Edda, mythology of, 175, 215. + + Eden, garden of, 175. + + Ego, the, 19. + + Egoism of religion, 272. + + Egyptians, doctrines of, 80, 222; + prayers, 115; + pyramids, 212; + lotus of, 214. + + Emotions, origin of, 10; + exclude thought, 19; + in religion, 49; + of fear and hope, 50, 51; + esthetic, 14. + + Entheasm, 148. + + Epochs of nature, 164 sq. + + Epicene deities, 66. + + Epilepsy and religious delusions, 75. + + Eros, 72. + + Esculapius, emblem of, 200. + + Esthetic emotions, 14, 244. + + Ethics, grounds of, 266. + + Excluded middle, law of, 27, sqq. + + Expectant attention, 74, 129. + + Explanation, limits of, 38. + + + Faith in religion, 107. + + Fascination, 74. + + Fear, in religion, 50, sqq. + + Female principle in religion, 62, 183. + + Feridun, garden of, 175. + + Flood, myth of, 169, sq. + + Fingers, as gods, 184. + + Force, orders of, 133. + + Freedom, 105. + + Friends, sect of, _see_ Quakers. + + Future life, doctrine of, 256, sq. + + + Gallican confession, the, 138. + + Generative function in religion, 62, 72, 73. + + Genius as inspiration, 149. + + Gnosis, the genuine, 74. + + Gnostic doctrines, 166. + + God, as father, 70; + spouses of, 69, 71; + mother of, 68; + sexless, 71; + earliest notions of, 78; + incomprehensible, 98; + throne of, 167; + love of, 73, 263, 276. + + Gods, + hierarchy of, 181; + quantification of the, 186; + of lightning, 207. + + Good, final victory of, 179. + + Grasshoppers, prayers against, 131. + + Greeks, art of, 16; + doctrines of, 80; + sophists, 96. + + Gudmund, King, 175. + + + Hades, 186. + + Hare, the Great, 212. + + Hell, 186, 258, 274. + + Hercules, 72. + + Hermaphrodite deities, 66. + + Hesperides, the, 175. + + Hierarchy of the gods, 181. + + High places, worship of, 215, 216. + + Historic ideas, 232. + + Holy spirit, as inspiring, 138; + brooding, 167. + + Hope, in religion, 51 sqq. + + Horæ, the, 165. + + Humanity, the religion of, 194, 253. + + + Ignorance, in relation to religion, 82. + + Illumination, 140. + + Immortality, doctrine of, 255. + + Indians, American, 125, 157. + + Insanity, religious, 76. + + Inspiration, 137. + + Intelligence, one in kind, 96; + as the first cause, 106, 111. + + Irmin, pillars of, 215. + + Ischomachus, prayer of, 126. + + Israelites, the Messiah of, 176. + + + Janus, an epicene deity, 65. + + Jehovah, 65, 156. + + Jemschid, king, 175. + + Jesus, face of, 67, 241; + conception of, 71; + wounds of, 130; + wisdom of, 144; + as second Noah, 170; + teachings, 178, 260; + prayer to, 187; + execution of, 203; + death of, 222. + + Judaism, 187. + + Judgment, day of, 172. + + + Kalpa, of Brahmans, 168. + + Knowledge, forms of, 21. + + Kosmos, the, 72, 144, 167. + + + Lateau, Louise, 130. + + Law, defined, 40; + of excluded middle, 27; + oldest, 248. + + Laws, the, of thought, 26, sq.; 101, sq.; + not restrictive, 105; + as purposive, 108. + + Light, as object of worship, 185. + + Lightning, the, in symbolic art, 207. + + Life, the perfect, 57. + + Lingam, the, 66. + + Lingayets, sect of, 66. + + Logic, applied, 23; + abstract or formal, 24; + mathematical, 24; + laws of, 101, sq. + + Logos, the, 42, 106. + + Lotus, as symbol, 213, sq. + + Love, as religious emotion, defined, 58, 60, 262; + of sex, 61, 63; + law of, 73; + of God, 73, 263, 276. + + + Ma, a goddess, 183. + + Maitreya, 176. + + Mamona, a Haitian deity, 68. + + Märchen, the, defined, 157. + + Marriage condemned, 69. + + Maypole, as a symbol, 215. + + Melitta, 65. + + Memory, physical basis of, 10; + ancestral, 75. + + Memorial, rites, 225. + + Messiah, the, 176. + + Millennium, the, 173, 268. + + Michabo, an Algonkin deity, 185. + + Mind, + growth of, 7; + extent of, 8, 271; + as seat of law, 163. + + Miracles, 110, 130. + + Mithras, 65. + + Mohammed, + notion of god, 71; + inspired, 146. + + Mohammedanism, 187, 224. + + Monotheism, origin of, 80, 81; 186, sq. + + Moral government of the world, 112. + + Morality, independent of religion, dualism of deities, 182, 249, 266, 267. + + Mormonism, 61. + + Motion, first law of, 11; + relation to time and space, 35; + manifestations of, 77. + + Myth, the, defined, 156. + + + Names, sacred, 156. + + Natural selection, in sensation, 10; + in logic, 101. + + Nature, + meaning of, 4, 39, 105; + epochs of, 164. + + Nemqueteba, 240. + + Neo-Hegelian doctrine, 194. + + Nirvana, the, 13, 57, 257. + + Noah, 170. + + Nous, the, 106. + + + Oannes, 170. + + Obelisk as symbol, 215. + + Odainsakr, 175. + + Odin, 53, 259. + + Optimism, 112, 269. + + Order, in things, 90, sq. + + Osiris, 165. + + + Pain, defined, 17. + + Parsees, doctrine of, 80, 166, 184. + + Pantheism, 188, 194, 247. + + Papas, a Phrygian god, 183. + + Paradise, lost and regained, myths of, 173, sq; + future, 257. + + Pentalpha, the, 212. + + Perfected commonwealth, idea of, 247. + + Perfected individual, idea of, 239. + + Personal survival, idea of, 255. + + Pessimism, 11, 112, 269. + + Persians, ancient, 176. + + Personality, the, 19, 270. + + Phallus, worship of, 62, 66, 214, 216. + + Phanes, the orphic principle, 190. + + Philosophy of religion, defined, 3; + of mythology, 159; + of history, 232. + + Phrygian divinities, 183. + + Pillar worship, 215. + + Pleasure, defined, 14. + + Polarization, as a principle of thought, 183. + + Porte Royale, miracles of, 131. + + Postulates of religion, 89. + + Prayer, 117, sq. + + Progression of development, 109. + + Protestantism, 128, 139, 250. + + Protogonus, 167. + + Psyche, and love, 72. + + Pythagoras, his thoughts on number, 189. + + + Quakers, sect of, 76, 115, 138, 147. + + Quantification of the predicate, 22; + of the gods, 186. + + Quetzalcoatl, 212. + + + Reason in religion, 106, 107; + drawn from sight, 186. + + Rebus in symbolism, 212. + + Regin, as name of gods, 90. + + Relative, the, 106. + + Religion, science of, 3; + philosophy of, 3; + personal factor of, 81; + not concerned with phenomena, 110. + + Reproductive function in religion, 62. + + Res per accidens, 182. + + Resignation, doctrine of, 128, 135. + + Revelation, marks of, 149. + + Rig Veda, the, 125. + + Rite, the, 217, seq. + + Roland, pillars of, 215. + + Roman Catholics, 76, 138, 141, 187, 250. + + + Sabians, myths of, 170. + + Sacraments, 227. + + Sacrifice, idea in, 218; + vicarious, 222. + + Saga, the, defined, 157. + + Saint Brigida, 146. + + Saint Gertrude of Nivelles, 146. + + Sakyamuni, _see_ Buddha. + + Saturnian Era, the, 175. + + Science of Religion, 3; + as knowledge of system, 92; + of mythology, 158. + + Secularization of symbols, 204. + + Sensation, defined, 9; + excludes thought, 19; + of pain and pleasure, 10. + + Sentiment, the religious, 3; + emotional elements of, 79; + rational postulates of, 87; + religion of, 250. + + Serpent, as emblem and symbol, 200, 206, 207. + + Sev, an Egyptian deity, 165. + + Sex, love of, 61, 63; + in nature, 71, 72, 216. + + Shekinah, the, 66. + + Siddartha, a name of Buddha, 121. + + Similars, law of, 204. + + Sin, sense of, 225. + + Sight, as the light-sense, 186. + + Siva, worship of, 66, 214. + + Soul, the, 19, 271. + + Specific performance in rites, 218, sq. + + Stigmata, the, 130. + + Sufficient reason, principle of, 91. + + Sukhavati, 175. + + Supernatural, defined, 4; + its relation to symbols, 205. + + Swedenborg, 75, 217. + + Symbol, the phonetic, 200; + origin of, 202; + related and coincident, 203. + + Symbolism, defined, 200. + + Synthesis of contraries, 37. + + Synthetic propositions, 32. + + + Tathagata, a name of Buddha, 121. + + Tau, the Egyptian, 210. + + Theology, 4. + + Thor, hammer of, 210, 239. + + Thought, as a function, 17; + laws of, 26, 101, sq.; + as purposive, 108. + + Tien, Mongolian deity, 185, 216. + + Time, not a force, 11; + but believed to be one, 165. + + Tlapallan, 175. + + Tree worship, 215. + + Triads, the Celtic, 190; + Platonic, 191. + + Triangle, the equilateral, 212. + + Trinity, the doctrine of, 191; + symbol of, 212. + + Triplicate relation of numbers, 190. + + Tritheism, of Christianity, 190. + + Truth, what is, 21; + eternal, 41; + as answer to prayer, 137. + + Tulan, 175. + + + Unconditioned, the, 29, 34, 37, 98, 100. + + Uniformity of sequence, as cause, 91, 92. + + Unknowable, the, 29, 34, 99, 100. + + + Valkyria, the, 53. + + Valhalla, 259. + + Varuna, an Aryan god, 125. + + Vendidad, the, 175. + + Venereal sense, the, 64. + + Vicarious sacrifice, theory of, 222. + + Virginity, sacredness of, 69. + + Virgin Mother, the, 68. + + Volition, _see_ Will. + + Voluspa, the, 171. + + + Wabose, Catherine, 146. + + Water, as the primitive substance, 167. + + Will, the, 16; + of God, 38, 42; + as a cause, 90. + + Wish, the religious, 52; + definition of, 79. + + World, moral government of, 112; + creation and changes, 164; + light of the, 185. + + + Xisuthrus, 170. + + + Year, the Great, 169. + + Yima, reign of, 175. + + Ynglyngasaga, the, 218. + + Yocauna, a Haitian deity, 68. + + + Zarathustra, 80, 114. + + Zeruana akerana, 166. + + Zweckgesetze, 108. + + + + +_PUBLISHED BY HENRY HOLT & CO._ + + +=BRINTON’S (D. 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Has a freshness and vivacity rarely found in works of the +kind.”--_Atlantic Monthly._ + + + + +Transcriber’s Note + + +The following misspellings and typographical errors were maintained. + + Page Error +TN-1 2 expres ion should read expression +TN-2 15 mind,whose should read mind, whose +TN-3 34 positive,and should read positive, and +TN-4 fn. 39-1 Systèmede should read Système de +TN-5 fn. 71-1 Suras, should read Suras +TN-6 91 reason’ should read reason” +TN-7 108 [108-1] should read [108-2] +TN-8 146 devil,before should read devil, before +TN-9 193 plantasm should read phantasm +TN-10 193 anthropomorphism,which should read anthropomorphism, which +TN-11 205 supernatual should read supernatural +TN-12 221 corrollary should read corollary +TN-13 fn. 214-3 and should read und +TN-14 Ads. p. 1 clergy. should read clergy.” +TN-15 Ads. p. 2 (His should read His + +Accents in foreign words are inconsistent and have been left as +originally printed. + +The following words were inconsistenly spelled or hyphenated: + + develop / develope + key-stone / keystone + May-pole / Maypole + re-gained / regained + thunder-storm / thunderstorm + _u. s._ / u. s. + Voelker / Vœlker + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Religious Sentiment, by Daniel G. 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