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ON RELIGION

SPEECHES TO ITS CULTURED DESPISERS

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FRIEDRICH SCHLEIERMACHER

TRANSLATED, WITH INTRODUCTION, BY

JOHN OMAN, B.D.

LONDON
KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUBNER & CO., Lr.
PATERNOSTER HOUSE, CHARING CROSS ROAD

1893

21

CONTENTS.

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PAGE
PREFACE. : ‘ ; ; ; ; ; ‘ : . vil
INTRODUCTION . ; ; ‘ : 4 : : ; ; oo ae
First SPEECH—DEFENCE ‘ A } ; : Ä ER
SECOND SPEECH—THE NATURE OF RELIGION ; | ; A
THIRD SPEECH—THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION . ; ; - 119

Fourta SPEECH—AssSOoCIATION IN RELIGION, OR CHURCH AND

PRIESTHOOD . ‘ ‘ i ; ; s : ‘ . 146
Firth SpEECH—THE RELIGIONS . ! ; : ; ; . 210
ErILoGvE ‘ . ; ; \ ; : ‘ : ‘ . 266
Tuer Fırst EpITIoN. : : ‘ i ; . 275

INDEX . 2 ‘ 7 P ; : ; ‘ ; : . 285

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PREFACE.

— —

In making this”translation, I have been deeply impressed
with the truth of Friedrich Schlegel’s saying, that the
modern literature, though in several languages, is only one.
Though this work, so far as I know, is now translated for
the first time, it does not now begin to enter into English -
thought. Traces of the movement at least, of which it is
the most characteristic product, may be found in our
philosophy, our theology, and our literature. Seeing, then,
that this book claims more than a merely philosophical
interest, it may well be thought that I should have done
something more to give. it an English accent. Intuition,
used broadly for immediate knowledge, and the All, the
Whole, the Word-Spirit for aspects of the world we feel
and seem to know, can hardly be acknowledged as natural
to our native tongue. But,though unfamiliar, I hope that,
in their connections, they are not incomprehensible. My
excuse for imposing upon the reader the necessity of a
second translation in thought, must be found in Schleier-
macher’s own opinion. ‘There are two ways, he considered,
of making a good translation: either the author must be
left alone as far as possible and the reader be made to
approach, or the reader be left and the author be manipu-
lated. In the former case, the work is translated as we
believe the author would have done it, had he learned the
language of the translation ; in the latter, as he would have
written, had it been his native tongue. In philosophical

vi PREFACE.

works, he thought the former method alone practicable.
If the wisdom and science of the author are not to be trans-
formed and subjected to the wildest caprice, the language
of the translation must be bent to the language of the
original. As we have not yet any example of a breach of
this rule that encourages imitation, I have not been bold
enough to make the attempt. Still I would fain believe
that, except the first half ofthe Second Speech, the book is
not beyond measure difficult. That section is acknowledged,
even by the most patient Germans, to be obscure, and I
would direct the reader’s attention to the summary in the
Appendix of its first form, which is very much simpler.
Further, I might suggest that in the first reading the
Explanations be omitted, and that it be borne in mind that
they are not meant to elucidate the text, but rather to
expand or modify it into harmony with later positions.
For a more careful study of the book, I have sought to
make the Index helpful.

My thanks are due to Professor Calderwood for encourage-
ment in the work, and to my friend, Mr. G. W. Alexander,
M.A., for revising the proofs and for many suggestions in
the translation.

ALNWICK, 1893,

INTRODUCTION.

—<»“c>—

As the“ Speeches on Religion ” were first published in 1799
this translation is in one sense exceedingly belated. In
Germany itself, however, it has been more commented upon
during the last twenty years than ever before. In 1868
Schenkel’s Sketch of Schleiermacher’s Life and Character was
published. In 1870 Dilthey’s Life of Schleiermacher fol-
lowed, at least the first volume of it, which is all that has yet
seen the light. In 1874 Ritschl published a treatise on
“‘ Schleiermacher’s Speeches on Religion and their influence
on the Evangelical Church of Germany.” ‘This was followed
by two very elaborate articles on the “Speeches” by
Lipsius in the “ Jahrbiicher fiir protestantische Theologie,”
wherein he drew attention to the very material changes. in
the various editions. In 1879 Piinjer made this apparent
by a critical edition, which gave the first edition in the
text, and the changes in foot-notes. Since then treatises
have appeared on the idea of religion in the different
editions by Braasch, on Schleiermacher’s conception of
Individuality by Frohne, on his relation to Christianity by
Otto Ritschl, and on the quintessence of his theology, a
severely hostile criticism, by Locke.

Why this book should attain the classic position of being
a subject for other books may well need to be explained
to the English reader. Under various titles it may be
found mentioned in certain learned treatises, but it would
be difficult to learn from any English book the place it

x INTRODUCTION.

occupies either in theology or philosophy. The reason is
not far to seek. The most earnest and thorough students
of this period have either had a wholly philosophical or a
wholly literary interest. For the former Hegel spoke the last
word, and for the latter Goethe. This book, being the out-
come of the literary, philosophical and religious movements
of the time, has very naturally fallen between. Even to such
a profound student of the time as Professor Adamson,
Schleiermacher is simply a philosopher who stopped short at
Spinoza, in parti-coloured combination with the theologian
who ended in mysticism.

Yet it may be questioned whether, after Kant’s Critique
and Goethe’s Wilhelm Meister, any book of the period has
had such a great and lasting effect, and itis certainly no
question that it foreshadows the problems chiefly discussed
among us to-day as is done by no other book of that time.
We have still with us the unity of the church, the relation
of church and state, inspiration, the non-christian religions,
the essential nature of religion, the place of religion in life.

Yet the interest and value of this book must now be
chiefly historical. It marks the transition from the “ Illu-
mination ”’ to the new time. Its very faults have a certain
importance, for they are a true reflection of that age of
ferment. As we try to recall those dim opponents, those
cultured despisers of religion, we see, in the closing years of
the century, a class of men engaged in high hope upon “an
intellectual Tower of Babel,” which was to be the object
both of their patriotism and their religion. It was a great
and not very lucid time, and the thoughts of it roll across
the pages of this book as a mixture of mist and broad sun-
shine.

Many estimates, not only of Schleiermacher himself,
but of this book may be found in German writers.
Zeller, the historian of Greek philosophy, says of him, ‘ that
he was the greatest theologian of the Protestant Church
since the Reformation. He was a churchman whose grand

INTRODUCTION. xi

ideas of the union of the Protestant confessions, of a more
liberal constitution of the Church, of the rights of science
and of religious individuality will force their way despite all
resistance. He was a preacher of mark, a gifted and
effective religious teacher, forming the heart by the under-
standing and the understanding by the heart. He was a
philosopher who without a perfected system sowed most
fruitful seeds, and he led in a new era in the knowledge of
Greek philosophy. He lent his aid in the work of the politi-
cal regeneration of Prussia and Germany. In personal
intercourse he exerted a wide and useful influence on count-
less minds, awakening in many a new intellectual life.’

Ueberweg, who quotes the above, says ‘ Schleiermacher’s
system is far inferior in formal perfection to Hegel’s or
Herbart’s, but it is free from many of their limitations, and
in its still largely unfinished form is more capable than any
other post-Kantian philosophy of such a development as
might remedy the defects of other systems.’

Neander, who ascribed to the “Speeches” more than to
any other influence his conversion from Judaism to
Christianity, and who passed through Schleiermacher to a
more definite Christian standpoint, said, in announcing
Schleiermacher’s death, “We have now lost a man from
whom will be dated henceforth a new era in the history of

® theology.” Lipsius in his articles says, “However much
or however little may ultimately remain of Schleiermacher’s
peculiar world of thought, his way of regarding the theory
of perception is as epoch-making in the religious sphere as
Kant’s ‘ Critique of Reason’ in the sphere of philosophy.”
Treitschke, the historian of Germany in the Nineteenth
Century, who ascribes to Schleiermacher a place second to
none in awaking the patriotism of his native land for the
great struggle with Napoleon, says, “He became the
renovator of our theology, the greatest of all our theologians
since the Reformation, and even yet no German theologian
arrives at inward liberty who has not settled accounts with

xiv INTRODUCTION.

position that it was a preacher’s duty to support the moral
law by appealing to the ordinary faith of the people.
Before his son’s birth he seems to have returned to the
orthodox faith. At all events, he dealt with his son’s
aberrations in the most uncompromising, denunciatory way. .
All his life he was burdened with debt, incurred chiefly in
book buying. He had wide interests and read extensively,
and his advice to his son is full of practical wisdom and
insight, yet he leaves the impression of being dogmatic and
even domineering, obstinate, and unstable. Consequently,
it was only after time had mellowed him that he entered
into kindlier and closer relations with his son. Schleier-
macher’s mother, again, leaves in her letters the most
beautiful impressions of piety, wisdom, and goodness. She,
however, died when her son, born in 1768, was only fourteen.

A year before her death, Friedrich had been placed in
the school of the Moravian Brethren in Upper Lusatia.
The Moravians were at that time doing for Germany what
the Methodists were doing for England. Amid barren
Deism and argumentative orthodoxy they maintained a dis-
tinctively religious spirit. Traces of their influence are
everywhere apparent in this book, and in the notes he
openly acknowledges his admiration for their institutions.
“ Verily,” he says in a letter, concerning their love feasts,
“there is not throughout Christendom in our day a form
of public worship that expresses more worthily or awakens
more thoroughly the spirit of true Christian piety.’ And
after all his wanderings, he felt he had become a “ Moravian
again of a higher order.”

Yet his sojourn among them was not without much out-
ward and inward conflict. His early letters are strongly
marked by the peculiar phraseology of the Brethren, He
strove hard for the supernatural experiences known as
intercourse with Jesus. After a time, he believed he had
found peace, and resolved to remain always among the
Brethren, though it were only to work at a trade. Yet the

~

INTRODUCTION. XV

Halle professor who was charged with botanizing in a green
jacket, was not quite extinguished. We hear from other
quarters of pleasant days spent in the woods, and he asks
his sister to hint to his father that his purse has caught
consumption from fruit.

In his seventeenth year he was transferred, along with his
bosom friend, Albertini, to the seminary at Barby, which
was at that time the University of the Brethren. “The
‚increase of liberty,” he says, “seemed to loosen the fetters
of the mind”; and again he calls this period “the first
blossoming time of the mind” A number of brilliant
spirits formed themselves into a “club’’ They read the
“Jena Literaturzeitung,”’ an able periodical that looked at
life from the standpoint of Kant; and from a “friendly
one-eyed man” in Zerbst, they obtained such books as
Wieland’s poems and Goethe’s “ Werther.” This was
enough to let them know that there was a large world of |
thought outside. The attempts of their teachers to hedge
in this mental activity, only increased their suspicion that
their doubts could not be answered by better means; and
even when prevailing opinions were controverted, there was
always a feeling that the other side had not been heard.
The Illumination had been working in Germany for about
twenty years, and was now everywhere prevalent, and all
the zeal of the Moravian teachers could not stop the chinks
whereby the flood was entering. Their suspicion and their
attempts at discipline only hastened the catastrophe; and
soon by manifold departure the poor club was scattered to
the winds. Among the first, Schleiermacher felt that he
also must be gone, if all his doubts were not to harden into
absolute unbelief,

In 1787, after overcoming much bitter opposition from
his father, he entered Halle as a student. Halle was then
at the height of its fame, and was almost entirely dominated
by the spirit of the Illumination. This was the ground of
his choice, for he believed that if ever he was to reach a

Xvi INTRODUCTIQN.

fuller faith, it must be by hearing AA hate that could be
said d against. it. During his two years’ stay in Halle, he
came entirely under the influence of the prevailing ideas.
“] have always believed,” he says in a letter to his father,
“that examination and investigation and the patient
interrogation of all witnesses and of all parties, is the only
means for attaining sufficient certainty, and above all for
setting a fast boundary between that on which a man must
take a side and that which, without injury to his peace and
happiness, may be left undecided:” a pretty accurate
summary of the Illumination ideal.

In Halle none of the theological professors impressed
him greatly. Semler, indeed, who has been called the
‘father of the critical study of the Scriptures, was not

without an influence on his views of Scripture exegesis,.

but Semler was now old and much troubled by disputes.
Kberhard, however, a professor of philosophy, may be con-
sidered a decisive influence in his life, for he led him to
the careful study of Kant’s Critique. If truth be told,
Schleiermacher was a very bad attender at lectures and
never perhaps entered much into the spirit of the University.
But in the garret in his uncle’s house, where he sat till two
in the morning, he studied, not pursuing subjects but seeking
truth for ‘life and death.’ Even before leaving Halle, he
wrote a treatise on the idea of the Highest Good, wherein
he tries to settle matters with Kant. But the frightful
conflict he had just come through still depressed his spirits,
and he had the worst opinion of the coarseness of his fellow-
students. His circumstances also were of the worst, which
rendered social intercourse somewhat trying for a proud
spirit. Yet he could never be without a friend, and he
found one in a fellow-student from Barby, a Swede, named
Gustav von Brinkmann. This youth, to whom he after-
wards dedicated this book, was a marvellous result of
Moravian training, sporting with Amaryllis in preference
to burning the midnight oil. But Schleiermacher was

one a

INTRODUCTION. xvii

persuaded that more than any man he lived laborious days,
and corrected and copied his love-letters for him and
admired his endless poetical compositions. With all his
faults, Brinkmann, by his larger knowledge of the world,
was at this period a useful friend.

After two years’ study his father’s willingness and ability
to support him were both exhausted. Vain efforts were
made to obtain a situation as family tutor, and nothing was
left but to go once more to uncle Stubenrauch, who had
left Halle and was now settled as pastor at Drossen near
Frankfort on the Oder. Hopes were entertained of pos-
sible acquaintances that might prove useful, and at all
events he could have house-room while he was preparing
for his theological examination.

Of this uncle, the brother of his mother, he says, “ would
that I had so availed myself of his friendship as to be able
to say in lieu of all praise, see what I have become and to
him I owe it.” In this uncle he encountered the very best
type of the theological spirit of the Illumination, an up-
right, earnest man, effective in his pastoral work, and
deeply interested in all questions of human progress. In
his house for a whole year Schleiermacher studied and
thought, reading such! books as came his way, and
having dim thoughts of authorship. Already his own
world of thought was taking shape, he had revised Kant
and come to some definite conclusions about him, and
chiefly stimulated by the loves and poesies of friend Brink-
mann he had thoughts that he did not think of revealing to
his uncle in spite of their free and affectionate intercourse.

With anything but liking for the business, he finally
went to Berlin to pass his examination in theology. His
father, who had married again, raised the needful money
"and not before time, for the candidate’s clothes, much
less than being fitted to make the right impression on
the authorities in Berlin, were hardly decent enough for
Drossen. To some extent the iron .had at this time

a

a INTRODUCTION.

entered his soul. He was poor and not very well, and his
slight deformity had been made a ground for refusing him
a situation.

But the examinations were successfully passed, and then
it became his duty to make himself agreeable to persons
with ecclesiastical patronage, relatives and acquaintances
of his uncle, highly respectable ‘moderates’ for the most
part. Aunt Stubenrauch’s urgent advice notwithstanding,
this part of the undertaking was exceedingly badly done.
“We observe gratefully,’ says his biographer, “ how in
this matter one generation after another in Germany
improves by practice.”

Finally, however, a situation was obtained for him. He
- became tutor in the family of Count Dohna of Schlobitten.
A new phase of life now opened for the student, which he
believed lasted as long as was good for him and no longer.

‘Good like a Dohna,’ was a proverb in Hast Prussia. At |

Schlobitten he found a simple and sincere piety along with
genuine refinement. For the first time he felt the influence
of cultured female society, an experience which he marks
as an epoch. “With a knowledge of the female heart I
won a knowledge of true manly worth.” To Friedrike, the
second daughter of the family, who died young, he spe-
cially ascribes this service. “She has taken it with her
into eternity and it will not I hope be the least that her
beautiful existence has accomplished.” The love of art
also was awakened in him, another dangerous possession for
the ‘ enlightened understanding.’ Above all he saw in the
family life of which the wise and capable mother was the
head, a beautiful fellowship ennobled by freedom, which
shone all the more in contrast to the memory of his own
youth. Wedike, a neighbouring pastor, an earnest, thought-
ful, patriotic man, was of great help to him, but: above all
in long solitary walks he came to understand himself. At
that time the eyes of all the civilized world were turned

towards the revolution in France. Schleiermacher pondered _

.
au id nu al an

INTRODUCTION. xix

deeply on the matter, giving his whole sympathy to the
popular side. Even when in 1793 Louis XVI. was executed,
though he regretted the cruelty, he could find no additional
horror in the fact that the head that had been severed, was
anointed. It was dangerous ground in the house of a
Prussian nobleman, more especially as he defended his
conviction, not merely with passionate earnestness, but
with argument and eloquence which put the irate Count to
rout. Yet the crisis came on education, not politics. The
Count had his own ideas on education, and espeeially on
the position of family tutors. The tutor had different
views, which were sustained by a very strong sense of self-
respect and of duty to his pupils. A great reserve of
somewhat sarcastic utterance also occasionally cropped
through his respect for his superiors. Finally the
irascible Count lost all self-control and spoke words which
he dimly desired to withdraw, but which the tutor assured
him would only make their relations more unpleasant if
he did. Wherefore, amid many tokens of good-will from
every side, and not least from the Count himself, Schleier-
macher departed with his heart almost breaking, but only
able to say, when he was paid double, that his employer
did himself much wrong.

In Schlobitten he parted with the Illumination, and
began his own development. None of his doctrines were
yet clear, but traces of them all, dim foreshadowings in
feeling rather than in thought, can be traced in his letters,
his sermons and in a fragment on the ‘Value of Life,’
which he wrote at this time and had some thoughts of
publishing. On the question of church and state especially
he had come to the conclusion that nothing can guarantee

complete tolerance but the entire separation of the two.

This shows how far he had departed from the Illumination

ideal which considered the church simply an institution for

the moral education of the people. His uncle feared evil

results and thought the clergy would starve, but the
a 2

Xx INTRODUCTION.

nephew had more faith in the power of the religious
sentiment. This position was doubtless first suggested to
him by the Moravian system, but it received confirmation
from the course of events in France, and was fixed by the
evils the ecclesiastical states caused to Germany in the
early days of Napoleon, when the princes of Germany
crowded “like flies on the bleeding wounds of their
country.”

After a few months in Drossen, he went to Berlin, where
the friendly influence of his relative Sack obtained for
him a position in an educational institution. Utter lack of
discipline, which his short sight prevented him from deal-
ing with, made his days unhappy, and in six months he
went to be curate to a relative at Landsberg on the
Warthe. While at Schlobitten, he had discovered his
vocation as a preacher, and had already begun his method
of careful mental preparation without writing, from which
he never afterwards departed. As a preacher he at once
took his place. His sermons of this period are marked by
great moral earnestness, which at times recalls Kant rather
than Jesus Christ. At the same time it is apparent that
he has been making a deeper study of Christianity and re-
flecting on his relation to its Founder. Two years passed
here peacefully and happily, in spite of small conflicts with
the authorities about educational matters to which he had
zealously devoted himself. Books were difficult to obtain,
but he thought the more, and was more diligent in corre-
spondence with friends, especially with his sister Charlotte,
who was still among the Moravians, and his father, who
now began to understand him. This change much consoled
him after his father’s death, which happened about the close
of these years. Finally, he entered on his career as an
author, by translating, along with his patron Sack, Blair’s
Sermons, the models of the respectable ‘ moderates’ of
that time.

When his relative Schumann died, the congregation

INTRODUCTION. xxi

asked of the authorities in Berlin that Schleiermacher
_ should be appointed, but he was considered too young, and
the place was given to his uncle Stubenrauch, much to the
old man’s sorrow. As compensation, Schleiermacher was
appointed preacher at the Charité Institute in Berlin. In
September, 1796, he entered upon his work.

Berlin had hitherto been the chosen home of the Illumin-
ation, and the leading preachers were all of the highly
respectable, cautious type of Rationalist, known, in Scotland
at least, as the ‘ moderate.’

The Illumination, or as it might better be translated, the
‘Enlightenment,’ was not a purely theological movement.
Kant defines it as “man’s emergence from self-caused
pupilage,” and he gives its watch-word as sapere aude, have

N \

courage to use your own understandings. It is peculiarly /

the movement of the Eighteenth Century. In England it
culminated in the Freethinkers, and in the form of Deism
wasin direct antagonism to the prevailing Christian faith.
In France the same movement under Voltaire was not
only more hostile to Christianity, but less earnest. Rousseau
carried the same teaching into social and political questions
and the “Gospel of Jean-Jacques”? was the creed of the
Revolution. Its essential feature was a demand for a
reason for everything from the standpoint of the individual.
The consequence was individualism in politics, sen-
sationalism in philosophy, and utilitarianism in morals.

In Germany, the movement never assumed the same
spirit of opposition to the church, and as a political develop-
ment was hardly possible, it took an almost exclusively
theological aspect. _Its creed consisted ofa personal God full
of wisdom and goodness ; immortality ; and the-necessity
of religious ideas for moral motives. In its directly
theological aspect, the movement became Rationalism,
the belief in Scripture as containing a revelation already
implicit in man’s mind, which in practice came to mean the
discovery of its own abstractions in the written word.

ne nn

xxii INTRODUCTION.

In so far as this Enlightenment was the end of man’s i.

nonage, it was inevitable and right. The authority of the
church had been extended to every department of life. In
all research, men wrought ‘with the sword of Damocles
over their heads.’ Now the rights of research were es-
tablished, and the church was directed to its own sphere:
and only in complete ignorance of history can it be main-
tained that this did not happen to the eminent profit of
both.

But this good was more than counterbalanced by its
easy-going optimism, its shallowness, its frivolity and
self-satisfaction. Understanding was the final test, and
argument the only proof. Religion was reduced to a few
commonplaces ; God was a scientificabstraction ; aspiration
succumbed to utter paltriness ; and the deeper needs of man
were fast becoming incomprehensible,

From one point of view Kant is the coping-stone of this
movement, from another he is the foundation of the new
time. He sought to found again the old Illumination
theology, in the same abstract way. His book, “ Religion
within the Limits of mere Reason,” makes religion simply
a handmaid of morality. If men were what they should
be, the mere moral law ought to carry its own authority,
but, to remedy the defect, the idea of a Lawgiver and an
all-seeing Hye is useful. Yet it is never to be forgotten
that all this is only a reflection of morality. Chiefly by
allegorizing, he weaves the dogmas of Christianity into his
system, everything finally being reduced to ethics and
metaphysics. |

Yet Kant, of allmen, introduced a more earnest spirib into

““ the time. Histrue fore-runner was Butler, with his maxim,

“if conscience had might as it had right, it would absolutely
govern the world.” “There is nothing absolutely good
in the world,” Kant said, at the beginning of his “ Critique
of Practical Reason,’ “a good will alone excepted.” An

action was not moral according to its consequences, but

INTRODUCTION. xxiii

according to the law from which it sprang. This law is not
an abstraction from experience of personal and social
requirement, but is uttered by reason the universal element
in man. Finally, while all consciousness is purely phe-
nomenal, man by the freedom of his will is rooted in the
real world, and takes his place as a thing initself. Whether
the critical philosophy will ultimately be found to have
circumnavigated the world of thought, or to be simply a
larger and more barren and dangerous excursion into
polar seas, may still be doubtful, but the greater moral
earnestness that Kant made possible for his time is now a
matter of history.

For ten years Schleiermacher had been constantly renew-
ing his study of Kant. He found his style of exposition
barbarous and he was annoyed by his misunderstandings
Be only of others, but of himself. Still he kept continually

‘ gnawing’ at him. Already he had rejected his proof of
the World and Freedom and God, and had departed
considerably from his. theory of perception, _ but he had
firmly settled with himself that the blessedness of life is

fulfilment of the law of reason. By this study of Kant,

_ Schleiermacher, though he did not come out quite unspotted

from intercourse with the Romanticists, at least rescued his
soul from deadly peril and, in the midst of the overweening
individualism of his contemporaries, held firm ground in
universal truth and law.

“In Plato Schleiermacher found the substance of Kant’s
teaching. Of late years also he had made a more earnest
study of Aristotle. Spinoza was only known to him through
Jacobi’s work, but he was already a devoted admirer and
pupil, and among his papers of this time is found a very
careful study of this great writer, wherein he corrects
Jacobi’s views on some important points.

In severe studies of this nature his life had hitherto been
spent. Such literature as he had read was mostly of an

xxvi INTRODUCTION.

which with such men as Friedrich Schlegel did not mean
much else than a rejection of the command ‘ Let a man
deny himself. They were all enthusiasts for the modern
literature, the principle of which they considered not beauty
but interest. Politically, Germany was at its lowest degrada-
tion, and the only unity in the empire was the new litera-
ture. Art,-therefore, was religion and patriotism in one.
“ We sought,” says Steffens, “to rear an intellectual Tower
of Babel, that all men might behold.” The great end was
to have an artistic appreciation of everything. Under-
standing was nothing, imagination was everything.
Schleiermacher himself, though he complains that the
want of the artistic sense was his worst limitation, would
sell the understanding of the world for a singularly small
equivalent in imagination. This desire to sympathetically
think again all human experience, led to such ardent and
careful historical research as is altogether without parallel.

The impress _of the School is more marked in the first
edition than in the later form of this work, but, as he himself
observed, it was so deep that no changes could remove. it.
The literary companions. were the cultured despisers to
whom he addressed himself. Their artistic sense most
nearly resembled his religious sense. He sought to make
them regard the Universe as the great work of art. For |
their idea of individuality he laid a philosophical and
religious basis. Their historical research gave him warrant
for claiming a high value for positive religions. Perhaps
their contempt for established institutions coloured his idea
of the church. Their exaltation of feeling, joined to
Moravianism, led to his view of religion. Finally, their
models determined the style of this book, described as
literary chiaroscuro.

But Schleiermacher’s previous philosophical discipline
and earnest ‘thinking out of his own position raised him
far above the ordinary standpoint of the Romantic School.
Schelling said, on reading the “ Speeches, >? & Whosoever

INTRODUCTION. xxvil

would produce anything of the kind must have made the
profoundest philosophical studies, or he must have written
it under blind d divine ee A Sch
Dilthey, - with careful toil, has not we indicated every
rivulet that trickled into the stream of Schleiermacher’s
thought, but has circumnavigated every lake from which it
might have come. By his help we can trace the growth
of the system which underlies this work. Schleiermacher
was conscious of his system, and was pained that no one
was able to discover it; and, to instructed eyes at least, it
is closely interwoven both with argument and with appeai.
- Subsequently, it was elaborated, filled in, and more
scientifically expressed, but the main outlines were never
changed. rd
¢ Kantis his starting-point, and he interprets him some-
ewhat after the manner of Fichte. Kant asked himself this
» question: What is this skein of self-consciousness, just
what we are conscious of and no more, and what are its
elaws? His answer was to conceive it very much as a
spider’s web. The elements out of which it is composed
float in promiscuously, and are called the manifold of sense.
They are spun into a net, according to a definite scheme.
e Lines converge at definite ‘angles: this is time and space.
¢ These concentric lines are bound together by cross-threads
at definite intervals: they are categories of judgment.
e Finally, all the lines converge to one point: it is the
¢ synthetic unity of apperception, the conscious I. Of this
¢ skein alone you are conscious. By thought you cannot get
outside of it, but by the claims of morality, as it were by
shaking the net, you learn that there is a spider underneath
that spins the web, and stout beams outside, known as the
* world and God, to which it is attached. The claims of the
moral law demand free-will that must be noumenal not
phenomenal, and goodness and happiness must ultimately
be one, therefore there must be a God.
9 /Schleiermacher rejected this proof, Ile did not accept

ad

Si NU eRe

xxvili INTRODUCTION.

free-will except as the outcome of the nature apart from

external compulsion, and he held that the Good does not
involve happiness. But for him also thought is activity,

*the mind is creative, and not merely receptive. From

Kants practical philosophy he accepted with unwavering
conviction the view that the moral law is the utterance of
reason, and that the highest good is to live in harmony with
reason.

To Fichte reason is nothing but the universal element
in life. It is in deadly struggle with all that is individual.
The ideal of reason was one for all men, to be established
in opposition to all accidents of life and diversities of
character. Practically, this was apt to mean that everyone
was wrong who was different from Johann Gottlieb Fichte.
Theoretically, it came more and more to mean that the
individual reason was simply the universal reason self-
limited.

For many years it did not occur to Schleiermacher to
question the position that reason is the identical element
inall men. Thestudy of Plato and Leibnitz seems to have
suggested to him that reason itself might be the source of
individuality. Leibnitz’s monads he regarded as an importa-
tion from Fairyland, yet they served to make him see that
the individual might be such a copy of the Universe as to
be not merely apart of it, but an exhibition of it.

» He had long and earnestly been studying Spinoza, and
‘acknowledged a large debt to him. Yet the Spinozism of
* Schleiermacher is more in form than substance. In his con-
ception of the Universe Spinoza’s distinction between natura
naturans and natura naturata re-appears, natura naturans -
being the World-Spirit. We also find his doctrine of the
immanence of the Infinite in the finite, and his distinction
between things in their observed relations, and things as
» seen sub specie xternitatis. But to Spinoza the individual
was merely a delusion of the imagination, a section
arbitrarily cut out of the Universe, while the motive of all

INTRODUCTION. xxix

Schleiermacher’s speculation was to find reality for the
individual as a whole within a whole. —

~ The Universe, in accordance with the new philosophy,
was conceived as infinitely active. In this part of Schleier-
macher’s doctrine there are distinct traces of Schelling.
This activity divides itself, but division is not separation,
but parallelism and interaction. This division that is not
separation, is found throughout the Universe. God indeed
is the union of knowledge and being, yet even He is only
known in His works. Spirit and body are not one, yet
they are nothing separate. The spiritual and sensuous in
life again are co-ordinate in morals, and the super-
natural and the natural in religion. The threads are, as it
were, spun for a moment apart, then woven into an
inseparable cord. There are thus no hard drawn lines in
the Universe, but it weaves all its activities together.

The fact that the individual is thus a part of one vast
whole, however, does not make it less a whole in itself.
Rather it must, before it could in such circumstances main-
tain an existence, have a principle fashioning its individu-
ality, uniting what comes to it from the Universe and
again re-acting upon the Universe. Thus the Universe
and the individual are equally real. Without the reality of
the Universe, the individual were nothing, for all its life
consists in being acted upon by the Universe and acting
upon the Universe again. By what means the Universe acts
upon us, whether by special ‘houmena or directly, we cannot
tell, but all our experience goes back to the point where our
own activity and the activity of Universe are in contact and
mutual understanding. By going back in thought, we
reach a mystic point beyond which we cannot go, but which
vis s the source of all our knowledge. That is the touch of
our spirits with the Universe whereby, like the touch of
lips that love, there are large mutual understandings.

¢* This is the source and the type of all experience. Per-

rum a

ception therefore rests not on reasoned knowledge but on

Sprays La

XXxil INTRODUCTION.

worldly-wise calculating type of education. Even art,
which should be inspired by religion, and is fitted in turn
to adorn it, satisfies men with a narrower object than the
Universe. By reflection we best awake to this larger
sense. We find that our souls are an epitome of all
mankind. Whatsoever any man has thought or felt comes

%to us as our thought and feeling. Nay, all that can be
thought is only possible to be thought because in some

sense it is ourselves already. As Plato expressed it,‘ all
knowledge is only recollection. Ourselves and all that we
know only exhibit one Universe.

This waking of the sense for the Universe is the larger
life. Before we were conscious only of paint, now, how-
ever dimly, we perceive the picture. How it shall define
itself in idea is not yet apparent and is a question of science,
and how it shall affect our actions is a question of ethics ;
but already there is a life of feeling. Fear unmixed it
cannot be, but it may be fear feebly changing to love, and
everything from fear to the perfect love which makes us
feel we are one with the Universe without a doubting or a
jarring note.

. Religion therefore 1s sense and taste for the Infinite,
part of human nature as either BIER vn: or action.
Because this has been obscured or forgatken; religion has

* fallen into evilrepute. Simply by setting religion by itself,
Schleiermacher hopes to fulfil the task he has set himself of

» awaking a new regard for religion. This purpose is much
more distinctly the aim of the first than of the second
edition.

“As a rule,” Schleiermacher himself said, “one age only
knows how to meet the errors of its predecessor by com-
mitting another error.” He somewhat exemplifies bis own
judgment, if not by actual perpetration, at least by an

« omission that made others perpetrate it. fe He did not show
how knowledge and conscience are implicit in feeling, as

En

INTRODUCTION. XXXili

they must be Gf it 1s immediatel tely given by t the ; Universe.
He is even at times found speaking as if one feeling might
correspond to two ideas, and one sense for the Universe
be represented by different t conceptions of God. He does
not show the ground of his own contention in later life
that religion must rest on truth and freedom. Yet it
must not be forgotten that he held no act of the mind

¢ single and distinct. Au activit of the mind is marked |

b ‚the element th that is most, prominent, in in it, and
= the pror ninent €le element i in religion i is feeling.

In Europe both science and morals had been nurtured by
Christianity, but science had already emancipated itself
from authority and morals was seeking an authority of its
‘own. It was necessary, therefore, to say that there was a
religious element in man not affected by either, and that
indifference to religion was indifference to the pro-

_ foundest element in man evident in some way among all
peoples.

But this artistic conception of religion is not merely a
simile to explain the nature of religion, it appears also in
his conception of the church. Religion cannot be conveyed
by instruction. Alla master can do is to exhibit his own
religion, just as an artist exhibits his own art to awake the
sense for art in his pupils. The vaster the variety of
religious emotion the better, because the Infinite is best
shown by the multitude and variety of its productions,
and each individual is the more likely to find what will so
harmonize with himself as to awake his own sense. There
should, therefore, be only one church that one may learn
more from those most different from him, and the visible
societies should be as fluid as possible, schools where the
pupil seeks the master, according to affinity, and departs to
another according to need.

The visible church does not consist of religious persons
but of persons seeking religion, though how people could
seek, religion without, in some degree, having the sense

b

A

xXXiv INTRODUCTION.

awakened for it, he does not explain. The members of the
true church, therefore, the masters in a divine art, shall be
the priests, not indeed to exercise official authority, but by
native superiority to have large respect and influence.

The supreme foe of religion is death. Wheresoever there
is activity there is hope. The state has been an evil in-
fluence in religion, because it has misled the church in its
own work, and subjected it to an authority to which no art
can submit without disaster. The state did not create the
evils. Evils were inevitable in this as in all human affairs, but
the state has fixed the evils and made them permanent. He
takes the most pessimistic view of the state church, and hopes
for little good till, by a revolution, it is overturned, or till
some other institution is allowed to grow up alongside of it.

In all this the pupil of the Moravians is manifest. He
calls attention to assemblies where no one man is priest
by office, but any man speaks who has the inspiration,

% apparently assemblies of Moravians. But there is also a

reason in his theory for making the visible society what

* Strauss has called “a merely infusorial life” Religion
« seeks only one system, the Universe. Wherefore, custom
sand, formality must be its chief foes. Hence, he never

altered his description of the visible church in the text,
though in the notes he acknowledges that the church con-
tains more religious people than he had thought and
should, in so far as it is the communion of the pious, be an
organization.

The last Speech has probably had more influence of
various kinds than any part of the book. The polemic

against the abstract jejune spirit of the Illumination

applied to religion the same principle that had already been
accepted by the younger generation in literature. Religion,

being infinite, must have a principle of individualization. —
ers: Schleiermacher’s doctrine of individuality found appli- ‘i
¢ cation. ach religion is not distinguished by the quantity §
of religious\ matter, but by the special form in which the —

INTRODUCTION. XXXV

matter is organized. The same religious matter appears in
all religions, but the fundamental intuition, selected, not
by any superiority but by some need or some insight of
the people and the age that believe it, and the mode in
which the rest is grouped around it, distinguish a positive
religion, What this would mean in respect of Judaism
he seeks to show. Though inadequate, there is deep and

fruitful historical insight. The relation of Judaism to

ee

Christianity he never fully acknowledged, and even in later
life he preached almost exclusively from the New Testament.
In his conception of Christianity his Moravian education
appears. In Moravianism the doctrine of the total depravity
of man and reconciliation by grace overshadowed all else.
Hence, the fundamental view of Christianity is “ the
universal resistance of all things finite to the unity of the
Whole and the way the Deity treats this resistance,’ and
the prevailing Christian note is sadness, and its attitude
ceaseless polemic against the difference between actuality
and the religious idea. _

The relation of this central intuition of Christianity to its
historical beginning and subsequent historical development
is in the first edition very slight. The historical Christ
seems at times only to be the discoverer and originator.

But we shall better understand the changes in the

second edition when we know Schleiermacher’s lifé up till
its appearance in 1806. é

The “ Speeches ”’ were at first little known to the theo-
logical world. The adherents of the old rationalistic school
were repelled by the pantheistic expressions in the book,
which were more prominent in the first edition than in its
later form. Sack, to whom Schleiermacher felt it his duty
to acknowledge his authorship, marvelled why he should still
wish to be a preacher of Christianity. Schletermacher

_ replied, “I hold the position of a preacher the noblest that

a truly religious, virtuous and earnest soul can fill, and I
shall never, with my will, exchange it with any other.”
b 2

XXXVi INTRODUCTION.

The elder Kantians, such as Schiller, thought the book pre-
tentious and barren, and troubled it no more. But in the
Romantic circle, now gathered at Jena, it created a great
enthusiasm. “ Novalis and Schlegel,” Caroline Schlegel
wrote Schleiermacher, “have made religion the order of the
day.” Novalis wrote many poems under the immediate
inspiration of the “ Speeches.” Already the interest of the
older school in antiquity was passing, and the new school
were deep in the Middle Ages. The new religion of
intuition and feeling accorded with this vein, and soon the
Christianity of the Middle Ages was the chief object of
glorification. Already Schleiermacher was in opposition,
telling Novalis that the papacy was the corruption, not the
perfection of Catholicism, but the artistic admiration for
Catholicism continued till many members of the Romantic
School found their way into the Church of Rome.

The offence of this book to the church party was
increased by the “ Confidential Letters on Lucinde ” which
followed it. Already Schleiermacher and Schlegel had
drifted far apart: Schlegel had wonderful gifts of adap-
tation. He had even maintained fora time a friendship with
Fichte, a man whose nature was nothing but ethical, ethical
in the narrowest sense. But already Schleiermacher had had
such proofs of Schlegel’s unreliableness as even his self-
sacrificing devoted friendship which gives him the high
distinction of being the only person in the circle in whose
letters Dilthey has found no duplicity, was unable to pass.
Schlegel had caused Dorothea, the daughter of Mendelssohn,
to separate from her husband, the banker Veit. Schleier-
macher sought to avert the separation, but when it was
done he urged Schlegel to marry her. Schlegel showed
himself utterly base and selfish in the whole matter, but |
Schleiermacher strove through it all to believe in him.
Schlegel was always in want of money, always at least
after he had drained his friends, and in his desire for funds
he wrote a novel “ Lucinde.” Imagination utterly failed

ee

INTRODUCTION. XXXVii

him, and to fill his book he set forth his relation with
Dorothea, in a way which Dorothea herself considered a
desecration of the temple of love, and Schleiermacher, in
remonstrating with him, described as a ‘ public exhibition,’
But necessities were urgent, and Schlegel published his
book. At onceastorm of adverse criticism arose. Dorothea
straightway turned round and besought Schleiermacher to
do something to defend her husband. He very unwillingly
consented. ‘The criticism had been more prudery than
purity, and Schleiermacher hated all unreality; he also found
in the book his own theory that the union of soul and body
is necessary for a complete human life, but his “ Letters,”
“though a good commentary, bore traces of being on a bad
text.”

Once more Schleiermacher stood largely alone. He
occupied his mind in writing his “ Monologues,” which
developes his moral philosophy as the ‘ Speeches” deve-
loped his religious philosophy. He also wrote upon the
Jewish question, opposing the desire to convert the Jewsto
a nominal Christianity, and urging that all civil privileges
should be accorded them in order that they might not
be led to endanger Christianity by embracing it through
indifference. But neither of those writings, so far as they
were known to be his, tended to re-establish him ecclesias-
tically.

Yet it was another matter that drove him from Berlin.
The current ideas of marriage were partly the result of the
corrupt society of the Berlin that had grown up around the
court of Frederick the Great, and partly of the spirit of a
time when all institutions were in the crucible. Even
Fichte is found recommending Dorothea Veit, after she
had separated from her husband, to his wife’s care. Schleier-
macher did not escape the spirit of the time. With a sub-
tilty that frequently prevented him from seeing practical
consequences, but which kept all his aberrations from
being matters of caprice, he wrought his views into his

xxxvill INTRODUCTION.

system. Hethen held that where there was no true union,
but where marriage was an emphatic hindrance to the
development of the soul, separation was a duty.

Here we find the weakness of all his early philosophiz-
ing. He was excessively short-sighted, the sensuous side
of him was weak, he was of student’s habits, and had a
student’s way of looking at life. To him an idea was a
‘sufficient motive, and the ideal a sufficient standard ; and
he was utterly ignorant of how much was needed to restrain
mankind,

Even with himself, however, this theorizing came to a
practical result. Eleonore Grünow, the wife of a pastor in
Berlin, had made an unhappy marriage. Griinow was not
only somewhat of a boor towards his wife, but Dilthey says
an immoral man. Schleiermacher began by giving sym-
pathy and good advice. Finally he advised divorce, and
when no other prospect was open for Eleonore, he offered
marriage.

To leave her absolutely free, he accepted Sack’s urgent
offer to leave Berlin for a pastorate at Stolpe, away in the
far north-east on the Baltic Sea. Eleonore finally resolved
to continue to bear her burden, and though Schleiermacher
passed through a very bitter struggle, long after, when he
met Eleonore in an assembly, he went up to her and said,
“God has been good both to you and me, Eleonore.”

In much affliction of body as well as mind, almost
entirely without the stimulus of literary companionship,
with the utmost difficulty in obtaining the materials for
study, he wrote in Stolpe his “ Outlines of all Existing
Theories of Morals.” Plato alonehespared. The moderns
seemed to him all to aim at one uniformity of ideal, without
any acknowledgment of individuality.

He also wrote on church reform, largely in the spirit of
the Fourth Speech of this book. He would have union,
not uniformity, freedom of belief and action. The
diminished external dignity of churchmen he considered

INTRODUCTION. cae) ee

good. He wished to see matters so arranged that no one
should be tempted to enter the ministry as an easy way of
getting a livelihood, as was the case especially with persons
of a lower social rank. He could wish another career to
be open for all who do not love the calling, but as that is
not possible, he would exclude “ blockheads, idlers, and
performers!” Above all, every man shall speak the truth
as he sees it, without fear of rank or prejudice.

Finally he was occupied with the translation of Plato.
It had been begun in partnership with Schlegel, but
Schlegel did practically nothing, breaking faith with
Schleiermacher and the publisher in the most offensive
manner. Schleiermacher set himself to the task alone, and
his friend Reimer, the Berlin publigher, accepted the
responsibilities, and for the first time paid him a reasonable
price for his work.

During all this time his chief interest had been in his
preaching and his instruction of the young, and he had
published a small volume of sermons. When a professor-
ship at Halle was offered to him, therefore, it was an
additional inducement that he was also to be University
preacher. A, Reformed preacher was an innovation, and
the University service was long postponed on various pre-
texts. Gradually however matters were arranged, and he
began to approve himself as a teacher and to be recognized
as a power in the pulpit. At this stage, in 1306, when
political disasters were falling upon his country, he issued
the second edition of this book. __

The nature and value of the many changes introduced
into the text have long been under discussion. Pünjer
seems to consider them chiefly a marring of the original
work. Lipsius thinks many valuable things in the first
edition are dropped, especially the use of intuition in re-
ligion, feeling alone having largely taken its place, yet he
grants many improvements.

The discussion has largely turned on the author’s

Br,
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yt 07
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x] INTRODUCTION.

‘Pantheism ” or “ Spinozism,” and his relation to histori-
cal Christianity. The most various views are defended. .
Schleiermacher began as a Pantheist, and ended in the same
0% way. Ritschl finds characteristic inconsistency. On the one
hand Schleiermacher regards the Universe simply as a work
ofart,religion being the artistic sense applied to the Universe,
which necessarily involves Pantheism; on the other his
doctrine of individuality gives a value to the individual as a
whole within a whole, that is entirely Christian and opposed
to Pantheism. Lipsius gives a very full and elaborate
@ comparison of the various editions, The first edition had
elements in it that made it the outer court by which
Schleiermacher himself and with him all modern theology
e entered into the Holy of Holies of Christianity. It was
clearer, the psychological process was more justly con-
ceived, it was less troubled by artificial theory, but on the
other hand the relation of religion to dogma and discipline
is less justly conceived, the hesitation to ascribe person-
* ality to God is more marked. The later editions are only
» Pantheistic in a very general way. Above all the author
has found his place not only in Christianity but in
Protestantism. Christianity is not now a transitory form,
but has a fundamental relation to a state of things that can
only end with time. Finally, Christ is not merely the
originator of the Christian intuition of the world, and men
are not merely Christians when they have His view, but
He is the centre of all mediation and to have the Christian
view is to be in a position to recognize His place when
« He is shown us. Again the changes are explained simply
aby difference of audience. The artistic paraphernalia are
simply a device for awaking in men whose whole interest was
in art, the sense for religion. This will certainly explain
some changes. The time had quite passed, and new mis-
apprehensions had to be guarded against.
Braasch defends Schleiermacher’s own view of the
changes. The later presentations are explained by the

INTRODUCTION. xli

thoroughly successful attempt to formulate better the same
original conception of fundamental problems. The author’s
own, view 28, given in the dedication to Brinkmann. The

»

books he says, bears the impress of the period which gave
it birth. But so utterly had the time changed that its
use for the new race of readers and thinkers was to be
doubted. Yet he might not now withhold it, having once
given it to the public. The colour of the time in which it
was written he neither could nor would remove. Where-
fore, he has only altered details that might cause mis-
understandings, and chiefly concerning the relation of
religion and philosophy. “But what I would willingly
have quite removed, had it been possible, is the mark, all
too strongly impressed on the whole book, of the untrained
beginner, who does not know the limits of the language he
has to deal with and who cannot succeed in presenting an

@ object as clearly as he sees it.” The essential meaning and
purpose of the book, however, he believes to be unchanged,
and even in the preface to the third edition he says that
already, i.e. when this book was first written, his “ way of
thinking had reached the form in which, with the exception
of what in every man years ripen and clarify, it has since
remained.”

Though every man is entitled to a hearing on his own

¢mental progress, he is not necessarily the best judge. Yet
the main outlines of Schleiermacher’s thought seem to have
remained unchanged} and if we allow the ripening and
clarifying process to involve a considerable change of spiritual

9 attitude we may accept his estimate. But he grew perhaps
more than any man with the growing age, and the most
superficial reader cannot fail to detect the difference.

Three points of difference between the Halle theological
professor of 1806 and the member of the Wednesday Club
of 1799 make themselves apparent. :

First, he has drifted out of the Romantic circle, and the
effusiveness of the first edition, especially the gush about

xlii | INTRODUCTION.

art has grown strange to him. Several references to
himself are erased or toned down, notably his confession
that he wished to do homage to the goddess of art, and that
the lack of the artistic sense is his most marked limitation.
For the same cause he moderates some figures of speech

® and softens many statements, But the newer lava is much

cooler than the old, and the mixture is a conglomerate of
soméwhat confused nature. This specially applies to the
first part of the Second Speech. There is a slight difference

6 of theory. Religion is feeling which gives reality to know-
«ledge and substance to morals. Religion in the old form

was intuition and feeling, without much reference either
to knowing or acting. Yet the excessive difficulty in the
present exposition is not in any great difficulty of the new
theory, but in the fact that/the Halle professor calmly said I
will expound the relations of science, religion and ethics,
whereas the Romanticist said passionately I must tear these
metaphysical and ethical rags off religion that men may
see it undisguised.

This leads to the second difference. The Schleiermacher
of 1806 was no longer in deadly struggle with the “ Illumi-
nation,” but had quite other misconceptions to guard
against. To the Illumination God was not only outside of
the world but outside of man. He was a person who
rewarded and punished. Dogmas were abstractions,
reached by understanding and useful for persuading to
moral action. Away with your dogmas altogether, and
away with your goodness produced by desire of Heaven and
fear of Hell, was his message. Just what the Illumination
gave no place to, was for Schleiermacher the surest - ‚part of
i “that in Him we live and move, and have our
being.” “Except through the world without and the world
within there is no knowledge of God. In opposition to the
Deistic view of God, he refuses to commit himself to any
statement about God’s existence as a person.

Yet even here it is evident that it is hesitation and not ;

INTRODUCTION. xliii

any definite Pantheistic creed that hinders him from
ascribing personality to God. He is conscious of the value
of his doctrine of individuality and und he knows that it dis-
tinguishes his system from. Spinoza. Place. for it in the
Universe there must be and God must be greater, not less.

In a letter to Sack he defends _anthropomorphistié- expres-

| nag ae ernest wes Oo

sions in religion as necessary for any utterance of it, which
means that our human ways of speech, such as to speak of
God as a person like ourselves, are so utterly inadequate as
to be no representation of reality, but still something on
the way to truth. But in rejecting religion as abstract
doctrine meant to influence morals, he scarcely stopped to
ask whether there was any right religious thinking, or
religious acting.
e In 1806 he stood opposed to an entirely different state
¢ of matters. Religion among his ancient friends was now
purely an esthetic feeling, dogma was denounced religious
@ discipline little regarded. The question of the relation of
o religion to knowledge and morals was urgent. Schleier-
macher solved the difficulty by saying that one part of the
mind can take the other for its object.
oe Thus the mind can make its feelings the object_of its
e thought, and doctrines arise. Religious ideas are reflections
eon religious feeling. This is the conception he works out
» in the Glaubenslehre (the Doctrine of Faith). Doctrines
are generalizations of feelings, but not therefore merely
subjective, for the feelings are the result of the operation of
the Universe, of personal experience, not merely of personal

48 excitability. ‘Lipsius | thinks if he had retained his _first

|
|
|
:
|
|

conception of intuition “he would have reached_the truth.

Doctrines are abstractions from our intuitions as well_as

oc

generalizations from our r feelings. —

In the same way the will may make the feelings an object to
work upon. Action is never to be from religion, but should
always be with religion. This has been uniformly criticized

as defective, but it rather seems to contain a profound truth.

xliv INTRODUCTION. |

Is not much damage done because zeal issues in act before
it has taken counsel with conscience, and spiritual disciplines
are determined upon not as the ascetic which a man’s own
conscience has decreed for him, but as the result of imme-
diate feeling or of a fashion in the religious communion ?

This change of position necessarily involves somewhat
more boldness in speaking of God and not merely of the
Universe. A positive religion is determined not by a
fundamental intuition of the Universe, but by a fundamen-
tal relation to God. Religion is somewhat strictly limited
to feeling, and traces of the theory that religion is the feeling
of absolute dependence, are manifest. That the theory is
rendered more consistent is doubtful, but the change was
made in the interests of a great truth, that religion has not
merely an esthetic but an ethical side. It has the merit
at least of stating a problem and suggesting its solution,
But the meaning of this theory will better appear in
considering the Explanations.

The third difference in the author which finds its way into
the second edition, is his deeper historical consciousness.
He has carried out a remorseless war against foreign
words. Inhis earlier days he made an unusually free use of
such words, but now, if any respectable native equivalent
can be discovered, they receive their quittance. He begins
with the title of the First Speech. “ Apology ” is supplanted
by the German equivalent here translated ‘ Defence.”
Even common words like philosophers and prophets are
changed to seers and wise men. Universe, the favourite
term of the first edition, is frequently replaced by Whole
and All, words of sadly alien aspect in the English transla-
tion. ‘These changes are by no means uniformly felicitous,
but they mark one of the greatest movements of modern
times. The artistic Tower of Babel Germany had been
dissolved by the “confusion of tongues,” and now, as the
shadow of the French invasion was gathering over her, her
sons were waking to an earnest and practical love for their
native land.

INTRODUCTION. xlv

Schleiermacher himself was conscious of the value of
this patriotism for religion. He speaks of it on p. 255,
note 2. For Schleiermacher’s theology as well as for his
life this movement was of value. It was his ‘high merit to
have _ maintained _ the social nature of religion and the
knowledge of divine things i in life and not apart from it,
but now he was to perceive the larger, more practical
bearing of his own doctrine. If each man is a whole

within a nationality that is a whole within humanity, a
morality that begins with the general elements of reason in
man, begins with duty to his country and to all men.
Similarly a man not only has his own religion, he not only ~
participates in the universal elements of all religion, but he
is rooted in t the form of religion in which his life has
grown. Historical facts he found to be realities of the
spiritual life. In those years he had also struggled with
himself and tested his theory in self-conquest, and found
that however lofty the conception of the individual, indi-
vidual J perfection i is not an adequate moral aim.

~ This change is m most apparent in the striking addition
called the Epilogue. > Here in contrast to Friedrich
Schlegel and his followers, he takes up a definite position
not only as a Christian, but as a Protestant, and he has no
more interest in new forms of religion either without or
within Christianity.

In the first edition he sets Christianity apart from all other
religions. He says he does not care how heathen religions
may be estimated. Judaism he describes for the value it
once had, but reckons it dead. Christianity he sets forth
unquestionably, according to his own demand, from his own
experience. There is a strength and power in in his descrip-
tion that bespeak personal devotion and reverence.

“Christianity is the religion of religions, a higher
power of religion. All religions do something to mediate
between the finite and the Infinite. But Christianity is
conscious of this as its highest aim. And what Christianity
is to other religions Christ is to other men. His expecta-

xlvi INTRODUCTION.

‘tion of a new religion of humanity is not an anticipation
that Christianity will be replaced, because he fears that its
purpose can only end with time, but the hope of some new
organization of the religious matter ‘that may wake the
religious sense in persons far distant from Christianity. It
is parallel with the conception which he subsequently re-
jected also, that idol worshippers will need to be prepared
for Christianity by Polytheism.

Shortly after this second edition, he published his
‘Christmas Festival” (Weihnachtsfeier), a dialogue
among representatives of various types of thought, who
discuss the non-supernatural views of the occasion of the
celebration. |

Hitherto Schleiermacher had been almost wholly a man
ofideas. In 1807 the defeat at Jena brought disaster upon
Prussia and upon Halle in particular. In the years of
humiliation that followed he became a man of action.
Even an opponent said, “In those years there was no
better patriot.” He rejoiced at the war because there
could be no worse evil than base submission, but he did
not deceive himself about the results. Napoleon, he
believed, hated Protestantism as he hated all independent
thought, and victory was scarcely to be hoped for except
by a coalition among the Protestant states of the North,
and then only after much purification by sorrow. The
end would demand every effort and self-sacrifice, and it
was worthy of it. The lives of us all are rooted in German
freedom and German sentiment, and they are at stake.”

His own circumstances were of the worst. Any little
possession he ever had, had been pillaged by the French
soldiers.’ Napoleon, using as a pretext the conduct of
the students, closed the University. For economy,
Schleiermacher and his youngest sister who lived with
him, joined Steffens in house-keeping, and even then he
was indebted to a French officer for wood for his winter’s
fire. -Butas long as “ potatoes and salt ” would hold out he

INTRODUCTION. xlvii

was determined not to move, although a tempting offer
was made to him from Breslau. As opportunities arose he
preached and did not shun to deal with the present sad
state of things. Meantime in the corner of Steffens’s study
he was as busy as ever with his pen. He is found review-
ing Fichte, the other great patriot of the time, with almost
fierce hostility. History had become real to Schleiermacher ;
Christianity he believed was the living power most needed
at that times and the cause of Protestantism and the cause
of Germany he regarded as one; and Fichte, he thought, had
made light of all three. At this time also he issued his
first effort at exegesis, an inquiry into the authenticity of
the First Epistle of Timothy. The divineness of Christianity
must stand by itself, and not depend on a different divine-
ness of the Scriptures. Each book in the Bible must be
@xamined by itself and its authenticity must be established
on the same canons that would be applied to any other
book.

At the close of 1807 he left Halle for Berlin. Halle had
been transferred to Westphalia, and as he would not pray
for the king and queen he could not preach. After long
delay and much poverty a new sphere opened for him in
Berlin. A new University was founded in the capital to
replace Halle, and Schleiermacher had much to do with the
construction of it. Once more he came into violent collision
with Fichte, who wished to make the University a sort of
_ philosophical cloister under the stern discipline of the state.
Schleiermacher maintained that science to be prosperous
must be independent of the state, even when it receives the
state’s support. By individual spirit and effort it must
prosper, by men who really taught and who were not merely |
paid for having the right to forget the existence of the
printing press.

By the Peace of Tilsit Napoleon had divided a large part
of the territory of Prussia among the neighbouring states,
and he continued by many oppressive devices his policy of

xlviii INTRODUCTION.

annihilation. The government was incapable of any right
decision ; but a band of true patriots arose, who without
any express union wrought together for the restoration of
their country. Schleiermacher was a recognized member,
and was despatched on several dangerous commissions.

In 1808, he was settled as preacher in the Dreifältigkeits
Church in Berlin, and he was not slow to use his oppor-
tunities for teaching national duties. Once he was
summoned before the French commander Davoust, but he
was so self-possessed that it came to nothing. During a
short time of peace afforded by the war with Austria, he
married the widow of his friend Willich; a marriage which
was none the less happy because it was begun with nothing
in store and with the utmost uncertainty as to the future.

The last link that bound him to the Romantic period was
now broken. Friedrich Schlegel and his wife had already
entered the Catholic Church; and henceforward, while
Schleiermacher was fighting for Prussia and for Protestant-
‘ism as one cause, Schlegel was in Austria, sinking ever
deeper into Ultramontanism.

The patriots under Stein’s leadership ck) reforms in
the state. Schleiermacher seized the occasion to demand
reforms in the church. He found the cause of the indiffer-
ence to public worship, of the failure of the religious
sentiment to influence morals, of the want of an active
relationship between preachers and their congregation,
and of the utter lack of church discipline, in the subordina-
tion of the church to the state, in the idea that it was a
mere state institute.

During the last great struggle with Napoleon, after the
disaster in Russia, Schleiermacher lent his aid in the
formation of the militia. Every morning he lectured as
usual, having determined to be the last to quit his post.
He preached with prophetic voice, showing the spiritual
purpose and the spiritual claims of such a time. Where
blame seemed to him to be due he spoke out, and for a

ie Ben ana a a ya

INTRODUCTION. xlix

newspaper article was severely censured by the government.
Finally he was among the first to enrol himself in a
battalion of the Landwehr, and spent some hours every
day in being drilled.

After Napoleon’s strength had been broken at Leipzig,
Schleiermacher was even more gravely suspected by the
government. For many years he had been subject to cramp
in the stomach, and in the troubles of the time it increased
upon him, but with tongue and pen he laboured to obtain
the constitution that had been promised in the time of
calamity.

For the freedom of the church especially he felt called
upon to fight. Instead of granting a constitution, the
government appointed a commission to draw up a liturgy
and to re-establish the ancient Lutheran rigidity. Schleier-
macher was already in bitter opposition to the spirit of the
time which he felt there was no one to oppose, and now he
came forward boldly as the critic of the commission. He
desired a constitution based on congregational representa-
tion. To their presbyteries and synods he would give all
matters of order and discipline. The teacher must be free
to speak the truth and he must not be bound by any
formula, but where he departs from the spirit and truth of
Christianity so as to alienate from him the congregation,
he is to be dealt with by the church authorities.

The king, not content with the commission, issued a
liturgy, largely composed by himself, which was enforced
in military churches, and was being extended to others. It
was directly contrary to the spirit of the Reformed Church,
and the manner of introduction was opposed to the spirit of

Protestantism. Schleiermacher, therefore, in spite of the

difficulty of opposing the king, felt called upon to speak.

_ The new liturgy was not only rigid, it gave the sermon and

congregational singing a very inferior place. Protestant
worship, Schleiermacher maintained, is based on truth and

freedom, and to that end teaching must have a prominent

Cc

] INTRODUCTION.

place, and the congregation must have a large liberty to
use the means best suited for its own edification.

He is also found defending the rights of critical study
of the Scriptures. “Purest simplest faith and sharpest
testing are one and the same, for no one that would believe
what is divine, should wish to believe deceptions old or
new, his own or other peoples’.” |

A certain outward unity of the Lutheran and Reformed
Churches had been brought to pass chiefly by the authority
of the king. Schleiermacher felt that a movement of this
kind should have been the outcome of the Christian
sentiment of the community ; but he also felt it his duty to
forward it by whatever means it might have been accom-
plished. This union, however, was followed by the most
arbitrary attempts at uniformity. The king, a well-meaning
but rather weak man, was convinced by his court ecclesiastics
that from Constantine and Charlemagne he inherited the
right and duty to be head of the church, and that this
transference of ecclesiastical power to the Prince of the
land was the true outcome of the Reformation. Schleier-
macher with trenchant argument and pungent sarcastic
wit, replied. While he spared such honest enthusiasts as
Harms, he chastised the time-servers with scorpions. If
all the Reformation did was to transfer the Pope’s power
to the Prince of the land, he thought there was need of
another reformation. The agenda was right for a
community that had been reared in the Catholic Church,
but Luther himself would have been the first to resist its
imposition in a merely traditional spirit on the church of
the Nineteenth Century.

For many years the struggle continued. Schleiermacher
was regarded as a political agitator, who sought to introduce
republicanism into the church as a beginning for introducing
into the state.

Meantime a movement similar to the High Church move-
ment which followed in England some ten years later was

INTRODUCTION. li

passing over Germany. Schleiermacher gradually felt that

@the spirit of the time was not with him. The people still
were on his side, but he was not fitted to be a popular leader
and years and illness were telling uponhim. While smaller
men had been dealt with by the authorities, he had been too
terrible an opponent to touch, and now many concessions

# were made to him. Finally he accepted a much simpler
form of the agenda, on the understanding that he was to use

eit as he liked. Thus the strife ended, and with it the
hope of a church that might by its own free vitality have
produced a new religious life in Germany.

e In the midst of these struggles he produced his last
great work, his “ Christian Doctrine of Faith ” (Christliche
Glaubenslehre), and, immediately after its publication, the
third edition of the “ Speeches ” appeared. The text was

little | changed. except in details of expression, but the

Explanations at the end of each Speech were added. They
represent the third and last stage of Schleiermacher’s
thought.

These Explanations are not to be regarded as expositions ~

_ of the text. They are an attempt to harmonize his earlier

utterances with his later, to guard against misconceptions,
to give more precise expression to the old ideas, usually in
the new dress of the Glaubenslehre, and finally to point out
to his time the lessons of his former teaching.

Strauss criticizes them very unfavourably. He considers
them a superintendence of the youthful Schleiermacher by
the old, which gives an unpleasant impression and “is the
same petty smallness of soul with which the theologians of

the Catholic Church compelled the Antinicene Fathers into
_ agreement with Athanasian orthodoxy.” Had he said this

of the changes in the second edition there might have been
some force in it, In how far it applies to the Explanations
the reader has the means of judging. ‘There is certainly a
very great difference of tone, and no man can harmonize

iy his youth with his old age without some errs but to

c 2

lii INTRODUCTION,

most minds the contrast will not give an unpleasant
impression, but be a very interesting study in the growth
of a very striking mind. |

These notes are not all alike of the same value, but they
touch on most points i in Schleiermacher’s later thinking | as
set forth in his ‘‘ Doctrine of Faith” and an earlier work
prepared in anticipation of the arrangement of the theolo-
gical faculty in Berlin University, “ A Short . Presentation
of Theological Study” (Kurze Darstellung des theologischen
Studiums). In this latter writing he accepts the funda-
mental fact of Christianity as entirely original, yet coming
to him through the consciousness existing in the Christian
or rather the Protestant communion. Theology therefore
is a positive science of the existing Christian consciousness
of God, linked to the practical task of guiding the church.
There are three chief divisions, philosophical,—to find
the place of Christianity in general religion, leading to
apologetics—historical and practical. Most characteristic
for his way of thinking is the insertion, not only of Dog-
matics but of Exegesis among historical sciences.

In the Introduction to the “ Doctrine of Faith” he .
discusses many matters already treated in this book, as can
be seen from the frequent references in the Explanations.

e Without the “Speeches” indeed it is hardly possible to
understand the whole bearing of his later views, especially
his doctrine that piety is the consciousness that we are
absolutely dependent, or what he considers the same thing,

gin relation to God. It is simply the old feeling and
intuition of the Universe with the idea of God more definite,
eand with amore definite moral purpose. Hegel’s criticism
that it would make Schleiermacher’s dog more pious than
himself may be a fair criticism of the terminology, but it

e has no truth in respect of the matter of the theory. It is
simply the consciousness of the roots of our nature.

* We live in the region of antithesis, but God is the

® unity of knowing and being. _Wherefore, though we are

INTRODUCTION. liii

always conscious of God, we cannot have a consciousness
that can stand outside. of Him-and regard Him, but cne of
immediate » contact only, : and therefore of absolute depen-
dence. This is not separate from our other experience but
is simply one side, the consciousness of freedom being the
other. Piety embodies itself in communities or churches,
and it may be distinguished by the stage or by the kind.
The first stage is Idolatry based on a confused sense of the
world, on admiration and terror ; next there is Polytheism,
involving clear sense perception and sense of law in
difference. The feeling of absolute dependence, however,
is only perfect in Monotheism, which involves a deeper self-
consciousness t that finds everything in. ‘itself and therefore
everything i in harmon ny with itself, and thus sees the world
as system. There have been three Monotheistic religions.
Judaism, however, by its constant limitation of God to

. Israel has affinities with Idolatry, and Mahommedanism, by
its sensuous and passionate character, shows Polytheistic

elements. Christianity, therefore, is the highest stage of

. piety.

In kind, Christianity is distinguished as more teleolo-
gical, that is, its pious emotions bear more on the moral] than
on the natural state of man, the Kingdom of Heaven being
its chief end. Judaism gives more prominence to personal
feeling and Mahommedanism is the esthetic type of piety,
its feeling of absolute dependence bearing on the passive
side of life. |

Further, Christianity is distinguished by its relation to
the redemption accomplished by Jesus of Nazareth. His
appearance in history is as a divine revelation not abso-
lutely supernatural or above reason. Every beginning is in
one sense supernatural, yet for the production of every man
there must have been an indwelling power of development
in the species, and though Christ, to be a universal divine
revelation, must be entirely set apart from other men, yet
human nature must have had the power to take up into it

|

}

liv INTRODUCTION.

the divine as it was in Christ, The actual implanting could
only be by a divine, an etermal act, but the temporal issue
of the act in a special person must be founded in the
original constitution of hunhan nature. And without more
than human reason He could not be a Redeemer for all, and
yet in a sense all that was in Christ must be in man,

® before we could have any need to be reconciled. There is
no way of sharing in Christian fellowship except by faith
in Jesus as the Redeemer. Dogmatic theology is the science
of the connection of the teaching valid in a Christian society

at a given time. The first duty of the theologian is to
discover a rule to distinguish the false from ‘the true. In
Christianity there are four natural heresies, which either
make Christ too near or too far from human nature, so that
either it cannot be redeemed, or it does not need redemption.
There are two Christological, the Ebionite and the Docetic,
and two anthropological, the Pelagian and the Manichzan.
Further the theologian must either be Protestant or
Catholic. In so far as the Reformation was not merely
purification of abuses, Protestantism makes the relation of
the individual to the church dependent upon his relation
to Christ, Catholicism on the contrary makes the relation
of the individual to Christ dependent on his relation to ) the
church.

Like many other men in Germany at that time he lec-
tured on a wide range of subjects. As a philosopher he
enjoyed a reputation not second to his colleague Hegel,
with whom, as an apostle of ideas and a Tory of the deepest
dye in all things social and political, he was frequently in
collision. He lectured on politics, esthetics, education,
philology and all departments of theology. Many of the
notes for these lectures have been published and help to fill
in the outlines of his scheme of thought.

In his own home, where in addition to his wife’s
two children by her former marriage, there were three
daughters and a son of his own, he enjoyed the most

INTRODUCTION. Iv

perfect happiness. He had many friends and much social
intercourse, which on account of very early rising did not
hinder him from overtaking an astounding amount of work.
Holidays were usually spent in travelling. He was a
great pedestrian, and even when most broken down by ill-
health and overwork, several days’ walking in all weathers
restored him. At times he made longer journeys and was
once at least in this country.
@ In 1829 his only son Nathaniel died. He made the
funeral speech himself, but he felt that at his age ‘such a:
@ wound heals no more.” He had long been acknowledged
@as the greatest preacher of his time. In the main his
audience consisted of educated people, particularly of
students, but he had hearers of all classes. A journal had
described him as a great man, and a sublime preacher.
‘We Germans,’ he said, ‘ascribe greatness to so few that
to say it of a man of my stamp can only be absurd, and
sublimity in preaching is against my principles. The
sublimer the Gospel the simpler must the preaching of it
@ be. His style was conversational, in the highest degree
natural, forcible and adapted to all. But after his son’s
death there was larger depth of sympathy, he spoke more
persistently of God’s love in Christ, and he was frequently
moved even to tears.

Almost to the end he was able to carry on all his work.
The will which had enabled him to work in so much sick-
ness, now resisted nature too far and he was seized with
inflammation of thelungs. On his death-bed he said “ Iam
in a state between consciousness and unconsciousness, but I
have the divinest moments. I must think the profoundest
speculative thoughts, and they are quite one with the
tenderest religious feelings.” Once hecried “ Lord I suffer
much.” Soon after the pain passed, then as if meditating he
said, “‘ Lord, I have never clung to the dead letter, and we
have the propitiatory death of Jesus Christ, His body and
His blood. I have ever believed and believe still that the

lvi INTRODUCTION.

Lord Jesus gave the Supper in water and wine.” Then
raising himself, he said, “ Are you also at one with me in
this faith that the Lord Jesus blessed also the water in the
wine?” On the assent of the by-standers he continued,
“Then let us take the Supper, you the wine and me the
water. -Let no one be troubled about the form.” After
the words of the institution he said, “ On these words of
the Scripture I rest, they are the foundation of my faith.”
Then turning to his wife he said, “In this love and commu-
nion we are and remain one.” A few moments more and
he had departed. It was the 12th of February, 1834.

To enter on the various criticisms of this book is impos-

‘

N, yo” ® sible. Its power was not in satisfying but _in stimulating
dt n gthe mind. The historical results, however, have been

Ns é\" “estimated in comparatively short space by Neander and

A x : Ritschl, men of pre-eminent qualifications.

ag ¢ “Whosoever,” says Neander, “ participated in the re-

ligious movements at the beginning of the Nineteenth Cen-
tury, will recognize how a pantheistic enthusiasm can be for
many a thoughtful and profound spirit a starting-point for
efaith in the Gospel. Specially important, as a stepping-
stone to the theological and religious development, was the
appearance of the “ Speeches on Religion” by the late
# Schleiermacher. This book was the occasion of a great
revolution and mighty stirring of spirits. Men of the
older generation, adherents of the ancient Christian super-
naturalism or earnest Rationalists whose living faith in a
God above the world and a life beyond was a relic of
it, rejected the pantheistic elements in the book with anger
and detestation. But those who were then among the rising
generation, know with what might this book that testified
in youthful enthusiasm of the neglected religious elements
in human nature, wrought upon the heart. In opposition
to a one- sided intellectualism, it was of the eset T-

acon in the heart, should be pointed out. It was a R

nn”

INTRODUCTION. Ivii

weighty impulse to science that men were directed from
the arbitrary abstract_aggregate called—the Religion—ot
Reason to the historical significance, in the flesh and blood
of life, of religion, and of rd of Christianity as part-of_reli ligion.
This accorded with the newly awakened interest and sense
for historical research.”

Ritschl is not free from using Schleiermacher as a pulpit
from which to preach to his age, and is more concerned to
show defects. He regards this book as the religious
programme of Romanticism. ‘It represents a movement
that would necessarily have had a large influence without
it, yet the soil would not have been so fruitful either of bad
@or good had not Schleiermacher tilled it. On page 144,
note 4, Schleiermacher disowns Pietism, nevertheless it
ewas intimately connected with him. Both had their root
ein Moravianism. Pietism, influenced by Methodism, made
a keen sense of sin a condition of assurance of Grace, while
Schleiermacher followed the earlier Moravian’type of a
child-like disposition towards Ged. Yet this penitence was
largely the refinement of the »sthetic sense so conspicuous
in the “Speeches.” The Pietists differ also from him in
attaching the state of feeling to the Lutheran doctrine of
Justification, and yet their position is derived from Schleier-
macher’s view of Christianity as reconciling men who by
nature cannot receive anything that is of the Spirit of
God, and they hold with him the prevailing mood of
Christianity to be sadness. Their type of preaching too,

is Schleiermacher’s mastership in the religious art. Where- -

fore they only influenced persons of a higher rank, and the
communion of the “awakened,” in the consciousness of
having proved their artistic sense in religion, regarded
themselves as the aristocracy of the church. They lacked
Schleiermacher’s large view of what makes a characteristic
personality, gave a smaller place than he did to religious
communion, and treated all their members as only on the
6 threshold of the Christian life, Aboveall they had nothing

lviii INTRODUCTION.

of his belief that all things lead to God, but having no
gospel for the six working days, had no message for the

' great mass of the toilers.

e Hierarchical Orthodoxy was justified by Schleiermacher’s
principle that ‘‘in their circle the perfect in religion have

eto rule” The modern Hierarchists are in their owu
opinion Lutherans, but in truth they are modified Schleier-
macherites. Their illusion of infallibility and dislike to
painful discussion does not rest on a knowledge of
Reformation theology, but on the esthetic sense, the
musical temperament.

‘“ Strauss in religious science never had a positive, a
fruitful, or even an original thought, but he has ever urged
the thought of another beyond the proper measure.”
His materialism is only the winter covering of what when

@the sun was high was his Romantic culture. The high
value assigned to individuality by Schleiermacher was
omitted by Strauss. Nor has it been rightly estimated by
any of his followers. Their movement has not followed
the conditions of personal responsibility and moral freedom,
and has been contrary to moral progress and characteristic
development of the individual.

% In practical. matters Schleiermacher’s influence has
been towards creating a hybrid unworkable relation of
the church to the state.

8 In scientific theology his examination of the general
idea of religion in relation to its kinds and grades, marks

® anera. His conception of each individual religion as an
organic whole is of great value, but he has encouraged the

® neglect of the study of the cult. Nor are his conceptions
of Judaism or Christianity adequate. Many of his most —
valuable suggestions have been neglected by his successors,
and the lack of systematic and exhaustive treatment which
was necessary for his aim in this book, has had an evil
influence on the method of his successors.’

ON RELIGION.

FIRST SPEECH.

DEFENCE.

Ir may be an unexpected and even a marvellous under-
taking, that any one should still' venture to demand
from the very class that have raised themselves above
the vulgar, and are saturated with the wisdom of the
centuries, attention for a subject so entirely neglected by
them. And I confess that I am aware of nothing that
promises any easy success, whether it be in winning for my
efforts your approval, or in the more difficult and more
desirable task of instilling into you my thought and in-
spiring you for my subject. From of old faith has not
been every man’s affair. At all times but few have discerned
religion itself, while millions, in various ways, have been
satisfied to juggle with its trappings. Now especially the
' life of cultivated people is far from anything that might
_ have even a resemblance toreligion. Just as little, I know,
do you worship the Deity in sacred retirement, as you visit
the forsaken temples. In your ornamented dwellings, the
only sacred things to be met with are the. sage maxims of
our wise men, and the splendid compositions of our poets.
Suavity and sociability, art and science have so fully taken
possession of your minds, that no room remains for the
eternal and holy Being that lies beyond the world. I
B

2 FIRST SPEECH.

know how well you have succeeded in making your earthly
life so rich and varied, that you no longer stand in need of
an eternity. Having made a universe for yourselves, you
are above the need of thinking of the Universe that made
you. You are agreed, I know, that nothing new, nothing
convincing can any more be said on this matter, which on
every side by sages and seers, and I might add by scoffers
and priests, has been abundantly discussed. To priests,
least of all, are you inclined to listen. They have long
been outcasts for you, and are declared unworthy of your
trust, because they like best to lodge in the battered ruins
of their sanctuary and cannot, even there, live without
disfiguring and destroying it still more. All this I know,
and yet, divinely swayed by an irresistible necessity | within ©
me, I feel myself compelled to speak, and cannot take back
“my invitation that you and none else should listen to me.
Might I ask one question? On every subject, however
small and unimportant, you would most willingly be taught
by those who have devoted to it their lives and their
powers. In your desire for knowledge you do not avoid
the cottages of the peasant or the workshops of the humble
artizans. How then does it come about that, in matters of
religion alone, you hold every thing the more dubious when ~
‚it comes from those who are experts, not only according to
their own profession, but by recognition from the state, and
from the people? Or can you perhaps, strangely enough, ~
show that they are not more experienced, but maintain
and cry up anything rather than religion? Scarcely, my
good sirs! Not setting much store on a judgment so
baseless I confess, as is right, that I also am a member of |
this order. I venture, though I run the risk, if you do not
give me an attentive hearing, of being reckoned among
the great crowd from which you admit so few exceptions. —
This is at least a voluntary confession, for my speech would
not readily have betrayed me. Still less have I any expec-
tations of danger from the praise which my brethren will

+

=
4
oe
.

DEFENCE, - | 3

bestow on this undertaking, for my present aim lies almost
entirely outside their sphere, and can have but small re-
semblance to what they would most willingly see and hear:
With the cry of distress, in which most of them join,
over the downfall of religion I have no sympathy, for I
know no age that has given religion a better reception
than the present. I have nothing to do wit the conserva-

tive and barbarian lamentation whereby they seek to rear

again the fallen walls and gothic pillars of their Jewish Zion.

Why then, as I am fully conscious that in all I have
to say to you I entirely belie my profession, should I not
acknowledge it like-any other accident? Its prepossessions
shall in no way hinder us.’ Neither in asking nor in answer-
ing shall the limits it holds sacred be valid between us.
Asa man I speak to you of the sacred secrets of mankind
according to my views—of w what was in me as with youthful
enthusiasm T sought the ur unknown, of what since then I
have thought and experienced, of th the innermost springs of
my being which shall for ever remain for me the highest,
however I be moved by the changes ( of time and mankind.
ido not speak. from any reasoned. resolve, nor from hope,
nor from fear. Nor is it done from any caprice or accident.
| Rather it is the pure necessity of my nature ; it is a divine
call; it is that which determines my ee ehe in the world
and makes me what I am. Wherefore, even ifit were neither
fitting nor prudent to speak of religion, there is something
which compels me and represses with its heavenly power
all those small considerations.

You know how the Deity, by an immutable law, has
compelled Himself to divide His great work even to
infinity. Each definite thing can only be made up by
melting tog gether. two opposite activities. Each of His
eternal thoughts can only be actualized i in two hostile yet
twin forms, one of which cannot exist except by means of
the other. The whole corporeal world, insight into which
is the highest aim of your’ researches, appears to the best

B 2

ay

-_

4 FIRST SPEECH.

instructed and most contemplative among you, simply a
never-ending play of opposing forces. Each life is merely
the uninterrupted manifestation of a perpetually renewed
gain and loss, as each thing has its determinate existence
by uniting oni holding fast in a special way the opposing
forces of Nature. Wherefore the spirit also, in so far as
it manifests itself in a finite life, must be subject to the
same law. The human soul, as is shown both by its pass-
ing actions and its inward characteristics, has its existence
chiefly in two opposing impulses. Following the one im-
pulse, it strives to establish itself as an individual. For
increase, no less than sustenance, it draws what surrounds
it to itself, weaving it into its life, and absorbing it into its
own being. The other impulse, again, is the dread fear to
stand alone over against the Whole, the longing to sur-
render oneself and be absorbed in a greater, to be taken
hold of and determined. All you feel and do that bears on
your separate existence, all you are accustomed to call
enjoyment or possession works for the first object. The
other is wrought for when you are not directed towards
the individual life, but seek and retain for yourselves what
is the same in all and for all the same existence, that in
which, therefore, you acknowledge in your thinking and
acting, law and order, necessity and cqunection, right and
fitness. Just as no material thing can exist by only one
of the forces of corporeal nature, every soul shares in the
two original tendencies of spiritual nature. At the ex-
tremes one impulse may preponderate almost to the ex-
clusion of the other, but the perfection of the living world —
consists in this, that between these opposite ends all com-
binations are actually present in humanity.

And not only so, but a common band of consciousness
embraces them all, so that tho though the man cannot be other ;
than he is, he knows every other person as clearly as himself,
and comprehends perfectly every single manifestation of
humanity. Persons, however, at the extremes of this great

DEFENCE. :: 5

series, are furthest removed from such a knowledge of the
whole, The endeavour to appropriate, too little influenced
by the opposite endeavour, takes the form of insatiable
sensuality that is mindful only of its individual life, and en-
deavours.only in an earthly way to incorporate into it more
and more material and to keep itself active and strong.
Swinging eternally between desire and enjoyment, such
persons never get beyond consciousness of the individual,
and being ever busy with mere self-regarding concerns, they
are neither able to feel nor know the common, the whole
being and nature of humanity. To persons, on the other hand,
too forcibly seized by the opposite impulse, who, from defec-
tive power of grasp, are incapable of acquiring any charac-

_ teristic, definite culture, the true life of the world must just as

much remain hidden. It is not granted them to penetrate
with plastic mind and to fashion something of their own,

but their activity dissipates itself in a futile game with
empty notions. ‘They never make a living study of any-
thing, but devote their whole zeal to abstract precepts that
degrade everything to means, and leave nothing to be an
end. They consume themselves in mistaken hate against
everything that comes before them with prosperous force.
How are these extremes to be brought together, and the
long series be made into a closed ring, the symbol of
eternity and completeness ?

Persons in whom both tendencies are toned down to an un-
attractive equilibrium are not rare, but, in truth, they stand
lower than either. For this frequent phenomenon which so
many value highly, we are not indebted to a living union of
both 'impulses, but both are distorted and smoothed away to
a dull mediocrity in which no excess appears, because all
fresh life is wanting. This is the position to which a false
discretion seeks to bring the younger generation. But were
a ene avoided in no other way, all men Ai have

ieee ene meter

: En the hig 1% ighe er Tr spirib would haye ee Feng the

6 FIRST SPEECH.

world, and the will of the Deity been entirely frustrated.
Elements so separated or so reduced to equilibrium would
disclose little even to men of deep insight, and, for a
common eye that has no power of insight to give life to
the scattered bones, a world so peopled would be only a
mock mirror that neither reflects their own forms nor
allows ‘them to see behind. it.

Wherefore the Deity at all times sends some here and there,
who in a fruitful manner are. imbued with both im impulses,
either as a direct gift from above, or as the result o of: a severe
and com complete self-training. They are equipped with wonder-
ful gifts, their way is made even by an almighty indwelling
word, They are interpreters of the Deity and His works,
and reconcilers of things that otherwise would be eternally
_ divided. I mean, in particular, those who unite those
opposing activities, by imprinting in their lives a character-
istic form upon just that common nature of spirit, the
shadow of which only appears to most in empty notions, as
an image upon mist. They seek order and connection,
right and fitness, and they find just because they do not lose
themselves. Their impulse is not sighed out in inaudible
wishes, but works in them as creative power. For this
power they create and acquire, and not for that degraded
animal sensuality. They do not devour destructively, but,
creatively recasting, they breathe into life and life’s tools
a higher spirit, ordering and fashioning a world that bears
the impress of their mind, Earthly things they wisely
control, showing themselves lawgivers and inventors,
heroes and compellers of nature; or, in narrower circles,
as good fairies they create and diffuse in quiet a nobler
happiness. By their very existence they prove themselves
ambassadors of God, and mediators between limited man
and i infinite humanity. To. ‘them the captive under the
power of empty notions may look, to perceive in their

requirements, and in their persons the material hitherto

an REEL UE

athlete Pate ad
7

DEFENCE. 7

| despised, with which he ought to deal. They interpret *

fo him the misunderstood voice of God, and reconcile
him to to ‘the earth and_to_his _place thereon. Far more
the earthly and sensual require such mediators from
whom to learn how much of the highest nature of
humanity i is wanting to t their own works and ways. They
stand in need of such : a person to oppose to their base

SA ee cme Ue TA RTE

animal enjo ‚ment another er enjoyment, the object of which
is not this thing or that, ‚but the t the One i in All, and All in One,
an n object that knows no other bounds but the world, that

the_spirit_ has learned to. ‘comprehend, He is ‘needed to

show to their anxious, restless self-love, another self- love
whereby 1 man in this carthly life and along with it It loves
the highest and the eternal, and to their restless passionate

greed a a quiet and sure possession.

Acknowledge, then, with me, what a priceless gift the
„pporance of such a person must be when the higher feel-
has risen to inspiration, and can no longer be kept

oe when every pulse-beat of his spiritual life takes

| communicable form in word or figure, so that, despite of his

indifference to the presence of others, he almost unwillingly

becomes for others the master of some divine art. This is

the true priest of the highest, for he brings it nearer those
who are only accustomed to lay hold of the finite and the
trivial: The heavenly and eternal he exhibits as an object of
enjoyment and agreement, as the sole exhaustless source of
the things towards which their whole endeavour is directed.

In this way he strives to awaken the slumbering germ of
a_better humanity, to_kindle love for higher things, to
change_ the common life into. a nobler, _to to_reconcile | the

nn

to counterbalance the deep attachment of the age to the
baser side. This is the higher priesthood that announces
the inner meaning of all spiritual ı secrets, and speaks from
the kingdom of God. It is the source of all visions and
prophecies, of all the sacred works of art and insp inspired

es FIRST SPEECH.

speeches that are scattered abroad, on the chance of finding
some receptive.heart where they may bring forth fruit.

Might it sometime arrive that this: office of mediator,
cease, and a fairer destiny await the priesthood of humanity ! |
Might the time come, which an ancient prophecy describes,
when no one should need to be taught of man, for they
should all be taught of God! Ifeverywhere the sacred fire
burned, fervid prayers would not be needed to call it down
from heaven, but only the placid quiet of holy virgins
to maintain it. Nor would it burst forth in oft-dreaded
flames, but would strive only to communicate equally to all
its hidden glow. In quiet, then, each one would illumine
himself and others. The communication of holy thoughts and
feelings would be an easy interchange, the different beams
of this light being now combined and again broken up, now
scattered, and again here and there concentrated on single
objects. .A whispered word would then be understood,
where now the clearest expression cannot escape miscon-
ception. Mencould crowd together into the Holy of Holies
who now busy themselves with the rudiments in the outer
courts. How much pleasanter it is to exchange with
friends and sympathizers completed views, than to go into
the wide wilderness with outlines barely sketched! But
how far from one another now are those persons between
whom such intercourse might take place! They are
scattered with as wise an economy among mankind, as the
hidden points from which the elastic primordial matter
expands on every side are in space. ‘The outer boundaries
of their sphere of operations just-touch so that there is no
void, yet one never meets the other. A wise economy
indeed! for all their longing for intercourse and friend-
liness is thus wholly directed towards those who stand most
in need, and they labour the more persistently to provide
for themselves the comrades they lack.

To this very power I now submit, and of this very nature
is my call. Permit me to speak of myself. You know that

DEFENCE. - 9

what is spoken at the instigation of piety cannot be pride,
for piety is always full of humility. Piety was the mother’s
womb, in whose sacred darkness my young life was
nourished and was prepared for a world still sealed for it.
In it my spirit breathed ere it had yet found its own place
in knowledge and experience, It helped me as I began to
sift the faith of my fathers and to cleanse thought and
feeling from the rubbish of antiquity. When the God and
the immortality of my der vanished from my doubt-
ing eyes it “remained to me Without design of mine it
guided me into active life. It “showed me how, with my
endowments and defects, I | should keep myself holy in an
undivided existence, and through it alone I have learnt
friendship and love. In respect of other human excellences,
before your judgment-seat, ye wise and understanding of
the people, I know it is small proof of possession to be able
to speak of their value. They can be known from descrip-
tion, from’ observation of others, or, as all virtues are
known, from the ancient and general traditions of their

nature. But ut religion | is of such a sort and_is so rare, that)

whoever utters anything of it, must necessarily have had it,
for nowhere could he have heard it. Of all that I praise,
all that I feel to be the true work of religion, you would find
little even in the sacred books. To_the man who has not
himself experienced it, it would only. be. an annoyance and a
Finally, if I am thus impelled to speak of religion and to

deliver my testimony, to whom should I turn if not to the

sons of Germany? Where else is an audience for my
speech? It is not blind predilection for my native soil or
for my fellows in government and language, that makes me
speak thus, but the deep conviction that you alone are
capable, as well as worthy, of having awakened in you the
sense for holy and divine things, Those proud Islanders
whom many unduly honour, know no watehword but gain
and enjoyment. Their zeal for knowledge is only a shaın

„>

10 FIRST SPEECH.

fight, their worldly wisdom a false jewel, skilfully and
deceptively composed, and their sacred freedom itself too
often and too easily serves self-interest. They are never
in earnest with anything that goes beyond palpable utility.’
All knowledge they have robbed of life and use only as
dead wood to make masts and helms for their life’s voyage
in pursuit of gain. Similarly they know nothing of religion,
save that all preach devotion to ancient usages and defend its
institutions, regarding them as a protection wisely cherished
. by the constitution against the natural enemy of the state.
For other reasons I turn from the French. On them,
one who honours religion can hardly endure to look, for
in every act and almost in every word, they tread its
holiest ordinances under foot. The barbarous indifference
of the millions of the people, and the witty frivolity with
which individual brilliant spirits behold the sublimest fact
of history that is not only taking place before their eyes,
but has them all in its grasp, and determines every move-
ment of their lives, witnesses clearly enough how little they
are capable of a holy awe or a true adoration. What does
religion. more abhor than the unbridled arrogance with
which the rulers of the people bid defiance to the eternal
Jaws of the world? What does it inculcate more strongly
than that discreet and lowly moderation of which aught,
even the slightest feeling, does not seem to be suggested
to them? What is more sacred to it than that lofty
Nemesis, of whose most terrible dealings in the intoxication
of infatuation they have no understanding ? Where varied
punishments that formerly only needed to light on single
families to fill whole peoples with awe before the heavenly
Being and to dedicate to eternal Fate the works of the poets for
centuries, are a thousandfold renewed in vain, how ludicrously
would a single lonely voice resound unheard and unnoticed.
Only in my native land is that happy clime which
refuses no fruit-entirely, There you find, though it be —
only scattered, all that adorns humanity. Somewhere, |

-

DEFENCE. IL

in individuals at. least, all that grows attains its most

. beautiful form. Neither wise moderation, nor quiet con-

templation is wanting; there, therefore, religion must find
a refuge from the coarse barbarism and the cold worldly
mind of the age.

Or will you direct me to those whom you look down upon

‚as rude and uncultured, as if the sense for sacred things

had passed like an old-fashioned garment to the lower
portion of the people, as if it became them alone to

__ be impressed with belief and awe of the unseen? Youare

well disposed towards these, our brethren. You would
have ‘them addressed also, on other higher subjects, on
morals, justice and freedom, that for single moments, at
least, their highest endeavours should be turned towards
better things, and an impression of the worth of man be
awakened in them. Let them be addressed at the same
time on religion; arouse occasionally their whole nature ;
let the holiest impulse, asleep or hidden though it be, be
brought to life; enchant them with single flashes, charmed
from the depths of their hearts ; open out of their narrow

' lives a glimpse into infinity ; raise even for a moment their

low sensuality to the high consciousness of human will and
of human existence, and much cannot fail to be won. But,
pray you, do you turn to this class when you wish to unfold

_ the inmost connection and the highest ground of human

powers ‚and actions, when ‘idea and feeling, law and fact
are to be traced to their common source, when you would
exhibit the actual as eternal and necessarily based_in the
nature of humanity? Is it not as much as can be looked
for if your wise men are understood by the best among you ?
Now that is just my present endeayour in regard to religion.
I do not ot seek to arouse single feelings possibly belonging to
it, nor to justify and defend single conceptions, but I would

conduct you into the profoundest depths whence every feel-
ing and conception receives its form. I I would sl 1 show you from

: what human tendency religion proceeds a and how it belongs.

12 FIRST SPEECH.

to what is for you highest and dearest. on the roof of the
sanctuary and discover its inmost secrets.

Do you seriously expect me to believe that those who
daily distress themselves most toilsomely about earthly
things have pre-eminent fitness for becoming intimate with
heavenly things, those who brood anxiously over the next
moment and are fast bound to the nearest objects can
extend their vision widest over the world, and that those,
who, in the monotonous round of a dull industry have not
yet found themselves will discover most clearly the living
Deity! Surely you will not maintain that -to your
shame? You alone, therefore, I can invite, you who are
called to leave the common standpoint of mankind, who do
not shun the toilsome way into the depths of man’s s spirit to
find his inmost emotions and see the living worth and con-
nection of his outward works.

Since this. became clear to me, I have long found myself
in the hesitating mood of one who has lost a precious jewel,
and does not dare to examine the last spot where it could
‘ be hidden. There was a time when you held it a mark of
special courage to cast off partially therestraints of inherited
dogma. You still were ready to discuss particular subjects,
though it were only to efface one of those notions. Such a
figure as religion moving gracefully, adorned in eloquence,
still pleased you, if only that you wished to maintain in the
gentler sex a certain feeling for sacred things. But that
time is long past. Piety is now no more to be spoken of, and
even the Graces, with most unwomanly hardness, destroy
the tenderest blossoms of the human heart, and I can link the
interest I require from you to nothing but your contempt.
I will ask you, therefore, just to be well informed and
thorough-going in this contempt.

Let us then, I pray you, examine whence exactly religion
has it its rise. Is it from some clear intuition, or from some
vague thought? Is it from the different kinds and sects

DEFENCE. 13

of religion found in history, or from some generalidea which
you have perhaps conceived arbitrarily ? Some doubtless
will profess the latter view. But here as in other things the
ready judgment may be without ground, the matter being
superficially considered and no trouble being taken to gain
an accurate knowledge. Your general idea turns on fear of
an eternal being, or, broadly, respect for his influence on the

occurrences of this life called by you providence, on expec-

tation of a future life after this one, called by you immor-
tality. These two conceptions which you have rejected,
are, you consider, in one way or another, the hinges of all
religion. But say, my dear sirs, how you have found this ;
for there are two points of view from which everything
taking place in man or proceeding from him may be
regarded. Considered from the centre outwards, that

is according to its inner quality, it is an expression of
1uman nature, based in one of its necessary modes of acting
or impulses or whatever else’ you like to call it, for I will
not now quarrel with your technical language. On the
contrary, regarded fromthe outside, according to the defi-

nite attitude and form it assumes in particular cases, it is
a product of time and history. From what side have you

considered religion that great spiritual phenomenon, that

you have reached the idea that everything called by this
name has acommon content? You can hardly affirm that
it is by regarding it from within. If so, my good sirs, you
would have to admit that these thoughts are at least in
some way based in human nature. And should you say
that as now found they have sprung only from misinterpre-
tations or false references of a necessary human aim, it
would become you to seek in it the true.and eternal, and to
unite your efforts to ours to free human nature from the
injustice which it always suffers when aught in it is mis-
understood or misdirected.

Byall that is sacred, and according to that avowal, some-
thing must be sacred to you, I adjure you, do not neglect

14 FIRST SPEECH.

this business, that mankind, whom with us you honour,
do not most justly scorn you for’ forsaking them in a grave
matter. Ifyou find from what you hear that the business is
as good as done, even if it ends otherwise than you expect,
I venture to reckon on your thanks and approval.

But you will probably say that your idea of the content
of religion is from the other view of this spiritual phe-
nomenon. You start with the outside, with the opinions,

dogmas and usages, in which every religion. is presented.

They always return to providence and ater Bee we For
these externals you have sought an inward and o riginal
source in vain. Wherefore religion generally can be nothing
but an empty pretence which, like a murky and oppressive
atmosphere, has enshrouded part of the truth. Doubtless
this is your genuine opinion. But if you really consider
these two points the sum of religion in all the forms in
which it has appeared in higtory, permit me to ask whether
you have rightly observed all these phenomena and have
rightly compr ehended their common content? If your idea
has had its rise in this way you must justify it by instances.

If anyone says it is wrong and beside the mark, and if he
‚point out something else in religion not hollow, but having
a kernel of excellent quality and extraction, you must first
_ hear and judge before you venture further to despise. Do
not grudge, therefore, to listen to what I shall say to those
who, from first to last, have more accurately and laboriously
adhered to observation of particulars.

You are doubtless acquainted with the histories of human
follies, and have reviewed the various structures of religious
doctrine from the senseless fables of wanton peoples to the
most refined Deism, from the rude superstition of human
sacrifice to the ill-put together fragments of metaphysics
and ethics now called purified Christianity, and you have
found them all without rhyme or reason. I am far from
‘wishing to contradict you. Rather, if you really mean
that the most cultured religious system is no better than

DEFENCE. : 15

the rudest, if yeu only perceive that the divine. cannot
lie in aseries that ends on both sides in something ordinary
and despicable, I will gladly spare you the trouble of esti-
mating further all that lies between. Possibly they may all
appear to you transitions and stages towards the final form.
Out of the hand of its age each comes better polished and
carved, till at length art has grown equal to that perfect
plaything with which our century has presented history.
But this consummation of doctrines and systems is often

anything rather than consummation of religion. Nay, not
infrequently, the p progress of the one has not the smallest :
connection with the other. I cannot speak¥of it without
indignation. All who have a regard for what issues from
within the mind, and who are in earnest that every side of
man be trained and exhibited, must bewail how the high and
glorious is “often turned from its destination and robbed of
its freedom in order to be held in despicable bondage by
the scholastic spirit of a barbarian and cold time. What
are all these systems, considered in themselves, but the
handiwork of the calculating understanding, wherein only by
mutual limitation each part holds its place? What else.
can they be, these systems of theology, these theories of the
origin and the end of the world, these analyses of the nature
of an incomprehensible Being, wherein everything runs to
cold argufying, and the highest can be treated in the tone
of a common controversy? And this is certainly—let me
appeal to your own feeling —not the character of religion.

If you have only given attention to these dogmas a and
opinions, therefore, you do not yet know religion itself, and
what you despise is not it. Why have you not penetrated
deeper to find the kernel of this shell? I am astonished at
your voluntary ignorance, ye easy-going inquirers, and at the
all too quiet satisfaction with which you linger by the first
thing presented to you. “Why do you not regard the religious
life itself, and first those pious exaltations-of the mind in
which all other known activities are set aside o or r almost sup-

nn een
summer

i6 FIRST SPEECH.

ressed, and the whole soul is dissolved in the immediate
fooling ng of the Infinite and Eternal? In such moments the
disposition you pretend to despise reveals itself in pri-
mordial and visible form. He only who has studied and truly
known man in these emotions can rediscover religion i in those
outward manifestations. He will assuredly perceive some-
thing more in them than you. Bound up in them all some-
thing of that spiritual matter lies, without which they could
not havearisen. But in the hands of those who do not under-
stand how to unbind it, let them break it up and examine
it as they may, nothing but the cold dead mass remains.

This recommendation to seek rather in those scattered
and seemingly undeveloped elements your object that
you have nct yet found in the developed and the com-
plete to which you have hitherto been directed, cannot
surprise you who have more or less busied yourselves with
philosophy, and are acquainted with its fortunes. With
philosophy, indeed, it should be quite otherwise. From its
nature it must strive to fashion itself into the closest con-
nection. That special kind of knowledge is only verified
and its communication assured by its completeness, and yet
even here you must commence with the scattered and .in-
complete. Recollect how very few of those who, in a way
of their own, have penetrated into the secrets of nature
and spirit, viewing and exhibiting their mutual relation and
inner harmony in a light of their own, have put forth at
once a system of their knowledge. In afiner, if more fragile
form, they have communicated their discoveries.

On the contrary, if you regard the systems in all schools,
how often are they mere habitations and nurseries of the dead
letter. With few exceptions, the plastic spirit of high con-
templation is too fleeting and too free for those rigid forms
whereby those who would willingly grasp and retain what is
strange, believe they are best helped. Suppose that any one
held the architects of those great edifices of philosophy, with-
out distinction, for true philosophers! Suppose he would

DEFENCE. 17

learn from them the spirit of their research ! Would you not —
advise him thus, “ See to it, friend, that you have not lighted
upon those who merely follow, and collect, and rest satisfied
with what another has furnished ; with them you will never
find the spirit of that art: to the discoverers you must
go, on whom it surely rests.” To you who seek | religion I
. must give the same advice. It is all the more necessary,
as religion is as far removed, by_its whole nature, from all
that is is systematic as philosophy i is naturally disposed to it.
~ Consider only with whom those ingenious erections
originate, the mutability of which you scorn, the bad pro-
_ portions of which offend you, and the incongruity of which,
_ with your contemptuous tendency, almost strikes you as:
- absurd. Have they come from the heroes of religion?
Name one among those who have brought down any
_ kind of new revelation to us, who has thought it worth
his while to occupy himself with such a labour of
_ Sisyphus, beginning with Him who first conceived the idea
_ ofthe kingdom of God, from which, if from anything in
_ the sphere of religion, a system might have been produced
_ to the new mystics or enthusiasts, as you are accustomed to
call them, in whom, perhaps, an original beam of the inner
light still shines. You will not blame me if I do not reckon
- among them the theologians of the letter, who believe the
salvation. of the world and the light, of wisdom are to be
found in a n new vesture of formulas, or a new arrangement
_ of ingenious proofs. In isolation only the mighty thunder
of their speech, announcing that the Deity is revealing
Himself through them, is accustomed to be heard when the
celestial feelings are unburdened, when the sacred fires
must burst forth from the overcharged spirit. Idea and
_ word are simply the necessary and Insenpzaple, outcome of
the heart, only to be understood by‘it and alone with 3 it.
| Doctrine is only united to d octrine occasionally to remove
; misunderstanding or expose unreality.
From many such combinations those systems were gradu-
C

18 ' FIRST SPEECH.

ally compacted. Wherefore, you must not rest satisfied with
the repeated oft-broken echo of that original sound. You
must transport yourselves into the interior of a pious soul and
seek to understand its inspiration. In the very act, ,„ you
must understand the production ı of light and heat in a soul
surrendered to the Universe.* . Otherwise you learn nothing
of religion, and it goes with you as with one who should too
late bring fuel to the fire which the steel has struck from
the flint, who finds only. a cold, insignificant speck of | coarse.
metal with which he can.kindle nothing any more.

I ask, therefore, that you turn from everything usually
veckoned religion, and fix your regard on the inward emo-
tions and dispositions, as all utterances and acts of inspired
méfdirect. Despite your acquirements, your culture and
your prejudices, I hope for good success. At all events, till
you have looked from this standpoint without discover-
ing anything real, or having any change of opinion, or
enlarging your contemptuous conception, the product of
superficial observation, and are still able to hold in ridicule
this reaching of the heart towards the Eternal, I will ‘not
confess that I have lost. Then, however, I will finally
believe that your contempt for religion is in accordance with
your nature, and I shall have no more to say.

Yet you need not fear that I shall: betake myself in the
end to that common device of representing how necessary
religion is for maintaining justice and order in the world.
Nor shall I remind you of an all-seeing eye, nor of the un-
speakable short-sightedness of human management, nor of
the narrow bounds of human power to render help. Nor
shall I say how religion is a faithful friend and useful stay
of morality, how, by its sacred feelings and glorious pros-
pects, it makes the struggle with self and the perfecting of —
goodness much easier for weak man. Those who profess
to be the best friends and most zealous defenders do indeed
speak in this way. Which of the two is more degraded in
being thus thought of together, I shall not decide, whether

DEFENCE. 19

justice and morality which are represented as needing
support, or religion which is to support them, or even
‘whether it be not you to whom such things are said.
Though otherwise this wise counsel might be given you, how
could I dare to suppose that you play with your consciences
a sort of fast and loose game, and could be impelled by
something you have hitherto had no cause to respect and
love to something else that without it you already honour,

and to.which you have already devoted yourselves? Or yr

suppose that these Speeches were merely to suggest what
you should do for the sake of the people! How could you,
who are called to educate others and make them like your-
selves, begin by deceiving them, offering them as holy
and vitally necessary what is in the highest degree in-
different to yourselves, and which, in your opinion, they
can again reject as soon as they have attained your level ?
T, at least, cannot invite you to a course of action in which
I perceive the most ruinous hypocrisy towards the world
and towards yourselves. To recommend religion by such
means would only increase the contempt to which it is at
present exposed. Granted that our civil organizations are
‚still burdened with a very high degree of imperfection and
have shown but small power to prevent or abolish injustice,
it would still be a culpable abandonment of a weighty
matter, a faint-hearted unbelief in the approach of better
things, if religion that in itself is not otherwise desirable
must be called in.

Answer me this one question. Could there be a legal
constitution resting on piety ?° Would not the whole idea
that you hold so sacred vanish as soon as you took such a
point of departure? Deal with the matter directly, there-
fore, if it seems to be in such an evil plight. Improve the
laws,.recast the whole constitution, give the state an iron
hand, give it a hundred eyes if it has not got them already.
At least do not allow those it has to sleep veiled in delusion.
If you leave a business like this to an intermediary, you

C2

WW l

20 FIRST SPEECH.

have never managed it. Do not declare to the disgrace of
mankind that your loftiest creation is but a parasitic plant
that can only nourish itself from strange sap.

Speaking from your standpoint, law must not even
require morality to assure for it the most unlimited juris-
diction in its own territory. It must stand quite alone.
Statesmen must make it universal. Now quite apart from the
question whether what only exists in so far as it proceeds
from the heart can be thus arbitrarily combined, if this
general jurisdiction is only possible when religion is com-
bined with law, none but persons skilled to infuse the spirit
of religion into the human soul should be statesmen. And
in what dark barbarousness of evil times would that land us! ©

Just as little can morality be in need of religion. A
weak, tempted heart must take refuge in the thought of
a future world. But it is folly to make a distinction —
between this world and the next. Religious persons_ at
least I know only one. If the desire for happiness is foreign
to morality, later happiness can be no more valid than
earlier ; if it should be quite independent of praise, dread
of the Eternal cannot be more valid than dread of a wise .
man. If morality loses in splendour and stability by every
addition, how much more must it lose from something that
can never hide its foreign extraction.

All this, however, you have heard of sufficiently from those
who defend the independence and might of the moral law.
Yet let me add, that to wish to transport religion into another
sphere that it may serve and labour is to manifest towards it
also great contempt. Itis not so ambitious of conquest as to
seek to reign in a foreign kingdom. The power that is its
due, being earned afresh at every moment, satisfies it.
. Everything is sacred to it, and above all everything holding
with it the same rank in human nature.’ .But it must
render a special service; it must have an aim; it must
show itself useful! What degradation! And its defenders
should be eager for it!

DEFENCE. 21

At the last remove, morality and justice also must conduce
to some further advantage. It were better that such utili-
tarians should be submerged in this eternal whirlpool of
universal utility, in which everything good is allowed to go
down, of which no man that would be anything for himself
understands a single sensible word, than that they should
venture to come forward as defenders of religion, for of all
men they are least skilled to conduct its case. High
renown it were for the heavenly to conduct so wretchedly
the earthly concerns of man! Great honour for the free
and unconcerned to make the conscience of man a little

sharper and more alert! For such a purpose religion does
not descend from heaven. What is loved and honoured
only on account of some extraneous advantage may be
needful, but it is not in itself _necessary, and a sensible
person simply values it according to the end for which it is
desired. By this standard, religion would be valueless
enough. I, at least, would offer little, for I must confess
that I do not believe much in the unjust dealings it would
hinder, nor the moral dealings it would produce. If that
is all it could do to gain respect, I would have no more to
do with its case. To recommend it merely as an accessory
is too unimportant. An imaginary praise that vanishes on
closer contemplation, cannot avail anything going about
with higher pr etensions. I maintain that in all better
souls piety s springs necessarily by itself ; ‘that a province of
its own in the mind belongs to it, in which it has un-
limited sway ; that ıt'is worthy to animate most profoundly
the n« noblest and best and to be fully accepted and known
by them, That is my contention, and it now behoves you
to decide whether it is worth your while to hear me, before
you still | further strengthen ‘yourselves in your contempt.

EXPLANATIONS OF THE FIRST SPEECH.

(1) Page 3.—Though I had been several years in the ministry
when this was written, I stood very much alone among my professional
brethren, and my acquaintance with them was small. What is here
rather hinted at than uttered was more a distant presentiment
than clear knowledge. Longer experience, however, and friendly

relations have only confirmed the judgment, that any deeper insight

into the nature of religion generally, or any genuinely historical, real
way of regarding the present state of religion is much too rare among
the members of our clerical order. We should have fewer complaints
of the increase of the sectarian spirit and of factious religious
associations, if so many of the clergy were not without understand-
ing of religious wants and emotions. Their:stand-point generally is
too low. From the same cause we have the miserable views so often
expressed respecting the means necessary for remedying this so-called

| decay of religion. It is an opinion that will probably find little

favour, which yet, for the right understanding of this passage

I cannot hide, that a deeper speculative diseipline would best
remove this evil. Most of the clergy, however, and most of those who
train them, do not acknowledge’ this necessity, because they foolishly
suppose it would render them more unpractical.

(2) Page 9.—The first conception both of God and immortality,
which at a time when the soul lives entirely in images is always
highly sensuous, does not, by any means, always vanish. With
most itis gradually purified and elevated. The analogy with the
human in the conception of the Highest Being and the analogy with
the earthly still remains the shell of the hidden kernel. But those
who are early absorbed in a pure contemplative endeavour take
another way. There is nothing in God, they say to themselves,
opposed, divided or isolated. Wherefore nothing human can be said

„of Him. Nothing earthly is to be transferred from the earthly

world that gave it birth in our souls. Both conceptions, therefore,
in their first forms are found untenable, they become incapable of
living reproduction and disappear. But this does not involve any

“positive unbelief, not even any positive doubt. The childish form
detininlneiemanaiibinhiihiasanaain

ET al eo

he EXPLANA TIONS . 23

vanishes with the known sensuous co-efficient, but_ the unknown
greatness remains in. ‘the soul, and its reality is apparent in the
endeavour to connect it with another co-efficient and so to > bring it to
a higher actual consciousness. In this endeavour faith is implicit,
even in no fully satisfactory solution. is reached. The unknown
greatness, even though it do not appear in any definite result, is
yet present in all operations of the spirit. The author was, therefore,
far removed from suggesting that there ever was a time when he
was an unbeliever or an atheist. Such a misunderstanding could only
arise in those who have never felt the he speculative impulse to an-
nihilate anthropomorphism in the conception of the Highest Being,
an impulse most clearly expressed in the writings of the ind |
Christian teachers.

(3) Page 10.—It is to be remembered that the severe nk of
the English people was given at a time when it seemed necessary to
protest strongly against the prevailing Anglomania. Moreover, the
popular interest in missions and the spread of the Bible was notthen
as apparent as it snow. Yet I would not on that account retract
much from my earlier judgment. For one thing the English are
well accustomed to organized private companies, whereby they unite
their individual resources for important undertakings. The results
obtained in this way are so great that persons, caring for nothing
but the progress of culture and the gain to be made of it,'are not ex-
cluded from sharing in enterprises that have taken their rise with a
far smaller number of truly pious people, and yet the principle is
not weakened. Nor isit to be denied that those undertakings are
regarded by a great number more from a political and mercantile point
of view. The pure interest of Christian piety does not dominate as
appears in this, that the religious needs at home have been attended
to much later and with much less brilliant result. These are merely
indications whereby I would express my belief that a closer acquaint-
ance with the state of religion in England would rather confirm
than disprove the above opinion. The same would apply to what
was said about the scientific spirit. As France and England were
‘almost the only countries in which we were interested, and which had
much influence in Germany, it seemed superfluous to glance elsewhere.
At present it might not be wrong to say a word on the capacity in
the Greek Church for such researches. Despite the fine veil cast
over-it by the fascinating panegyrics of a Stourdza, all depth is lost
in the mechanism of antiquated usages and liturgical forms. In all
that is most important for a mind aroused to reflection, it still stands
far behind the Catholic Church.

(4) Page 18.—A pious spirit, which is here unquestionably the sub-

.

24 FIRST SPEECH.

. ject of discourse, is dealin always defined as a soul surrendered to
God. But here the Universe is put for God and the pantheism of
the author is undeniable! This is the interpolation, not interpreta-
tion of superficial and suspicious readers who do not consider that
the subject here is the production of light and warmth in such a
spirit, the springing of such pious emotions as pass immediately
. into > religious ideas and views (light) and into & temperament
of surrender to God (warmth). It was therefore desirable to call
attention to the way in which such emotions take their rise.
‚They arise when a man surrenders himself to to the Universe, and are
only habitual in a spirit in ‘which such surrender is habitual. Not
only in general, but on each occasion we are conscious of God and of
His divine power and godhead by the word of creation, and not by
any one thing taken by itself, but by it only in so far as it is
embraced in the unity and completeness in which alone “God is
immediately revealed. “The further development of this subject
can be seen in my “ Glaubenslehre,” § 8, 2, and § 36, 1, 2.

(5) Page 19.—That the state would not be a constitution if it
rested on piety, does not mean that the state so long as it labours
under imperfection can do without piety, the thing that best supplies
all deficiency and imperfection. This would only mean, however,
that it is politically necessary for the citizens to be pious in pro-
portion as they are not equally and adequately pervaded by the
legal principles of the state. Humanly speaking this perfection is
not to be looked for, but were it once effected the state, in respect of
its own particular sphere of operation, could dispense with the piety
of its members. This appears from the fact that: in states where
constitutionalism has not quite triumphed over arbitrariness, the
relation of piety between the governor and the governed is most
prominent and religious institutions have most sway. This ceases
when the constitution is strengthened, unless indeed an institution
have some special historical basis. When afterwards (page 20) it is
said that statesmen must be able to produce universally in men the
sense of law, it will doubtless appear absurd to those who think of
the servants of the state. But the word statesman is here taken in
the sense of the ancient moXırırös, and it means less that he accom-
plishes something definite in the state, a thing entirely accidental,
than that he first of all lives in the idea of the state. The dark times
referred to are the theocratic’ times. I make this reference because
Novalis, my very dear friend in other respects, wished once more to
glorify the theocracy. It is still, however, my strong conviction that
it is one of the most essential tendencies of Christianity to separate
completely church and state, and I can just as little agree with that

EXPLANATIONS. 25

glorification of the theocracy as with the opposite view that the
church should ever more and more be absorbed in the state.

(6) Page 20.—I am not using the privileges of the rhetorical method
to say to the despisers of religion at the very beginning that piety
surpasses morality and law. Also I was not concerned in this place
to say which is first, for, in my opinion, piety and scientific specula-
tion share with each other, and the more closely they are conjoined.
the more both advance. The distinction however will be found in
my “ Glaubenslehre,” but here I had to defend the equal rank of
morality, law and piety in 1 human nature. In so far as the two
former do not involve an immediate relation of man to the
Highest Being, they, are inferior to the third, but all alike regulate
as essentially what is eminent and characteristic in human nature.
They are functions of human nature not to be subordinated to one
another, and in so far are equal. Man can just as little be thought
of without capacity for morality or endeavour after government as
without capacity for religion.

SECOND SPEECH.

THE NATURE OF RELIGION.

You know how the aged Simonides, by long and repeated

hesitation, put to silence the person who troubled him with
the question, What are the gods? Our question, What is

religion ? is similar and equally extensive, and I would ld fain

begin with a like hesitation, Naturally I would not mean
by ultimate silence, as he did, to leave you in perplexity.
But you might attempt something for yourselves; you
might give steady and continuous attention to the point
about which we are inquiring; you might entirely exclude
other thoughts. Do not even conjurors of common spirits
demand abstinence from earthly-things and solemn stillness,
as a preparation, and undistracted, close attention to the
place where the apparition is to show itself? How much more
should I claim? Itisa rare spirit that I am to call forth,
which can, only when long regarded with fixed attention,
be recognized as the he object of your desire. You must have
that unbiassed sobriety of judgment that seizes clearly and
‘accurately every outline. Without being misled by old
memories or hindered by preconceptions, you must

endeavour to understand the object presented simply by .

T cannot hope for any unanimity about the meaning of
religion or any recognition of its worth.

I could wish to exhibit religion in some well known
form, reminding you, by feature, carriage and deportment,
of what here and there at least you have seen in life.
__ Religion, however, as I wish to show it, which is to say, in

itself. Even then it may not win your love, and otherwise

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. ce

its own original, characteristic form, is not accustomed to
appear openly, but is s only. seen in secret by those who love
it, Not that this applies to religion alone. N. othing
that is essentially characteristic and peculiar can be quite
the same as that which openly exhibits and represents it.
Speech, for example, is not the pure work of science nor morals
of intention. Among ourselves at the present time this is
specially recognized. It belongs to the opposition of the new
time to the old that no longer is one person one thing, but
everyone is all things: Just as among civilized peoples, by
extensive intercourse their characteristic ways of thought no
longer appear unalloyed, so in the human mind there is such
a complete sociableness founded, that no special faculty or
capacity, however much it may be separated for observation,
can ever, in separation, produce its work. Speaking
broadly, one is, in operation, influenced and permeated by
the ready love and support of the others. The predominat-
ing power is all you can distinguish. Wherefore every
activity of the spirit is only to be understood, in so far as a
man can study it in himself, Seeing you maintain that in
this way you do not know religion, it is incumbent upon
me to warn you against the. errors that naturally issue from
_ the present state of things. We shall, therefore, begin by
reviewing the main points in your own position to see
whether they are right, or whether ‘we may from them
reach the right. Al

Religion is for you at one time a way of thinking, a faith,
a peculiar way of contemplating the world, and of combin-
ing what meets us in the world: at another, it is a way of
acting, a peculiar desire and love, a special kind of con-
duct and character. Without this distinction of a theoreti-

cal and practical you could hardly think at all, and though

both sides belong to religion, you are usually accustomed
to give heed chiefly to only one ata time. Wherefore, we

shall look closely at religion from both sides.

We commence with religion as a kind of activity.

+

28 SECOND SPEECH.

Activity is twofold, having to do with life and with art. You
would ascribe with: the poet earnestness to life and cheer-
fulness to art; or, in some other way, you would contrast
them. Separate them you certainly will. For life, duty u,
the watchword. The moral law shall order it, ‚and virtue
shall show itself the ruling power in it, that the individual
may be in harmony with the universal order of the world,
and may nowhere encroach in a manner to disturb and
confuse. This life, you consider, may appear without any
discernible trace of art. Rather is it to be attained by
rigid rules that have nothing to do with the free and -
variable precepts of art. Nay, you look upon it almost asa
rule that art should be somewhat in the background, and
non-essential for those who are strictest in the ordering of
life. On the other hand, imagination shall inspire the
artist, and genius shall completely sway him. Now im-
agination and genius are for you quite different from virtue
and morality, being capable of existing in the largest
measure along with a much more meagre moral endowment.
Nay you are inclined, because the prudent power often
comes into danger by reason of the fiery power, to relax for
the artist somewhat of the strict demands of life.

How now does it stand with piety, in so far as you regard
it as a peculiar kind of activity? Has it to do with right
living? Is it something good and praiseworthy, yet different
from morality, for you will not hold them to be identical? But
in that case morality does not exhaust the sphere which it
should govern. Another power works alongside of it, and
has both right and might to continue working. Or will
you perhaps betake yourselves to the position that piety is
a virtue, and religion a duty or section of duties? Is religion
incorporated into morality and subordinated to it, as a part
tothe whole? Is it; as some suppose, special duties towards
God, and therefore a part of all morality which is the per-
formance of all duties? But, if I have rightly appreciated
or accurately reproduced what you say, you do not think so.

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 29

-Yourather seem to say thatthe pious person has something en-

tirely peculiar, both in his doing and leaving undone, and that
morality can be quite moral without therefore being pious.

And how are religion and art related? ‚They can hardly
be quite alien, because, from of old, what is greatest in art
has had a religious character. When, therefore, you speak
of an artist as pious, do you still grant him that relaxation
of the strict demands of virtue? Rather he is then sub-
jected, like every other person. But then to make the cases
parallel, you must secure that those who devote themselves
to life do not remain quite without art. Perhaps this
combination giv gives its peculiar form to religion. With your
view, there seems no other possible issue.

Religion then, as a kind of activity,is a mixture of
elements that oppose and neutralize each other. Pray is -
not this rather the utterance of your dislike than your
conviction ? Such an accidental shaking together, leaving
both elements unaltered, does not, even though the most —
accurate equality be attained, make something specific.
But suppose it is otherwise, suppose piety is something
which truly fuses both,.then it cannot be formed simply by
bringing the two together, but must be an original unity.
Take care, however, I warn you, that: you do not make such
an admission. Were it the case, morality and genius apart
would be only fragments of the ruins of religion, or its
corpse when itis dead. Religion were then higher than
both, the true divine life itself. But, in return for this
warning, if you accept it, and discover no other solution,

be so good as tell me how your opinion about religion is to

be distinguished from nothing? Till then nothing remains
for me but to assume that you have not yet, by exami-
nation, satisfied yourselves about this side of religion.
Perhaps we shall have better fortune with the other side—
what is known as the way of thinking, or faith.

You will, I believe, grant that your knowledge, however
many-sided it may appear, falls, as a whole, into two con-

30 ‘ SECOND SPEECH.

trasted sciences. How you shall subdivide and. name
belongs to the controversies of your schools, with which at
present I am not concerned. Do not, ther efore, be too
critical about my terminology, even though it come from
various quarters. Let us call the one division physics or
{ metaphysics, applying both names indifferently, or indicating
f sections of the same thing. Let the other be ethics)or'the
doctrine of duties or tactical philosophy. At least we are
_agreed about the distinction meant. The former describes
“the nature of things, or if that seems too much, how man
conceives and must conceive of things and of the world as
the sum of things. The latter science, on the contrary,
teaches what man should be for the world, and what he v
should do in it. Now, in so far as religion is a way of
thinking of something and a knowledge about something,
has it not the same object as these sciences? W.hat does
faith know about except the relation of man to God and to
the world—God’s purpose in making him, and the world’s
power to help or hinder him? Again it distinguishes in its
own fashion a good action from a bad. Is then religion
identical with natural science and ethics? You would not
agree, you would never grant that our faith is as surely
founded, or stands on the same level of certainty as your
scientific knowledge! Your accusation against it is just that.
it, does not know how to distinguish between the demonstrable
and the probable. Similarly, you do not forget to remark
diligently that very marvellous injunctions both to do and
leave undone have issued from religion. You may be quite
right; only do not forget that it has been the same with that
which you call science. In both spheres you believe you
have made improvements and are better than your fathers,
What then, are we to say that religionis? As before,
that it is a mixture—mingled theoretical and practical
knowledge? But this is even less permissible, particularly
if, as appears, each of these two branches of knowledge
has its owm characteristic mode of procedure. Such

THE NATURE OF RELIGION, 31

a mixture of elements that would either counteract or
separate, could only be made most arbitrarily. The
utmost gain to be looked for would be to furnish us
with another method for putting known results into shape
far beginners, and for stimulating them to a further study.
But if that be so, why do you strive against religion? You
might, so long as beginners are to be found, leave it in
peace and security. If we presumed to subject you, you
might smile at our folly, but, knowing for certain that you
have left it far behind, and that it is only prepared for us
by you wiser people, you would be wrong in losing a serious
word on the matter. But it is not so, I think. Unless I
am quite mistaken, you have long been labouring to pro-
vide the mass of the people with just such an epitome of
your knowledge. The name is of no consequence, whether
it be “religion” or “enlightenment” or aught else. But
there is something different which must first be expelled,
or, at least, excluded. This something it is that you call
belief, and it is the object_of your hostility, and not ‘an
article you would desire to extend.

Wherefore, my friends, belief must be something different
from a mixture of opinions about God and the world, and of
precepts for one life or for two. Piety cannot be an instinct
craving for a mess of metaphysical and ethical crumbs. If it
were, you would scarcely oppose it. It would not occur to
you to speak of religion as different from your knowledge,
however much it might be distant. The strife of the cultured
and learned with the pious would simply be the strife of
depth and thoroughness with superficiality ; it would be the
strife of the master with pupils who are to emancipate them-
selves in due time.

Were you, after all, to take this view, I should like
to plague you with all sorts of Socratic questions, till I
compelled many of you to give a direct answer to the
question, whether it is at all possible to be wise and pious
at the same time. I should also wish to submit wh¥ther in

32 . SECOND SPEECH.

other well-known matters you do not acknowledge the
principle that things similar are to be placed together and
particulars to be subordinated to generals? Is it that you
‚may joke with the world about a serious subject, that in
religion only the principle is not applied? But let us
suppose you are serious. How does it come, then, that in
religious faith, what, in science, you separate into two
spheres, is united and so indissolubly bound together that
one cannot be thought of without the other? The pious
man does not believe that the right course of action can be —
determined, except in so far as, at the same time, there is
knowledge of the relations of man to God; and again right
action, he holds, is necessary for right knowledge. Suppose
the binding principle lies in the theoretic side. Why then
is a practical philosophy set over against a theoretic, and
‚ not rather regarded asa section? Or suppose the prin-
ciple is in the practical side, the same would apply to
a theoretic philosophy. Or both may be united, only in a
yet higher, an original knowledge. That this highest,
long-lost unity of knowledge should be religion you cannot
believe, for you have found it most, and have opposed it
most, in those who are furthest from science. I will not
hold you to any such conclusion, for I would not take up a.
position that I cannot maintain® This, however, you may
well grant, that, concerning this side of religion, you must
take time to consider what is its proper significance.

Let us be honest with one another. As we recently
agreed, you have no liking for religion. But, in carrying
on an honourable war which is not quite without strain, you
would not wish to fight against such a shadow as that with
which we have so far been battling, It must be something
special that could fashion itself so peculiarly in the human
heart, something thinkable, the real nature of which can so
be presented as to be spoken of and argued about, and
I consider it very wrong that out_of things so disparate as
modes of knowing and modes of acting, you patch together

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 33

an untenable something, and call it religion, and then are
so needlessly ceremonious with it. But you would deny
that you have not gone to work with straightforwardness.
Seeing I have rejected systems, commentaries and a

logies, you would demand that I unfold all the original
sources of religion from the beautiful fictions of the Greeks
to the sacred scriptures of the Christians. Should I not /
find everywhere the nature of the Gods, and the will of
the Gods? Is not that man everywhere accounted nely j
and blessed who knows the former, and does the latter ?
But that is just what I have already said. Religion
never appears quite pure. Its outward form is ever deter-
mined by something else. Our task first iskto exhibit its
izue nature, and not to assume off-hand, as you seem to do,
that the outward form and the true nature are the same.
Does the material world present you with any element in its
original purity as a spontaneous product of nature? Must
you, therefore, as you have done in the intellectual world,
take very gross things for simple? It is the one ceaseless
aim of all analysis to present something really simple. So
also it is in spiritual things. You can only obtain what is
original by producing it, as it were, by a second, an artificial
creation_in_yourselves, and even then it is but for the
moment of its production. Pray come to an understanding
on the point, for you shall be ceaselessly reminded of it.
But let us go on to the sources and original writings
of religion. To attach them to your sciences of resist-
ance and of action, of nature and of spirit is an un-
avoidable necessity, because they are the sources of your
terminology. Furthermore the best preparation for
_ awaking consciousness for your own higher subject is to
study what has already been more or less scientifically
thought. The deepest and highest in a work is not always
either first or last. Did you but know how to read between
the lines! All sacred writings are like these modest books
which were formerly in use in our modest Fatherland. Under
D

34 SECOND SPEECH.

a paltry heading they treated weighty matters, and, offering
but few explanations, aimed at the most profound inquiry.
Similarly, the sacred writings include metaphysical and
moral conceptions. Except where they are more directly
poetic, this seems the beginning and the end. But of you

it is expected that, seeing through the appearance, you will
recognize the real intent. It is as when nature gives
precious metals alloyed with baser substances, and our skill
knows how to discover them and restore them to their
refulgent splendour. The sacred writings were not for
perfect believers alone, but rather for children in belief, for
novices, for those who are standing at the entrance and
would be invited in, and how could they go to work except
as Tam now doing with you? They had to accept what
was granted. In it they had to find the means for stimu-
lating the new sense they would awake, by giving a severe
concentration and lofty temper to the mind. Can you not
recognize, even in the way these moral and metaphysical
conceptions are treated, in the creative, poetic impulse,
though it necessarily works in a poor and thankless speech,
an endeavour to break through from a lower region to a
higher? As you can easily see, a communication of this
sort could be nothing other than poetical or rhetorical.
Akin to the rhetorical is the dialectic, and what method
has from of old been more brilliantly or more successfully
employed in revealing the higher nature, not only of
knowledge, but of the deeper feelings ? But if the vehicle
alone satisfies, this end will not be reached. Wherefore,
as it has become so common to seek metaphysics and
ethics chiefly, in the sacred writings, and to appraise them
accordingly, it seems time to approach the matter from the
other end, and_to begin with the clear cut distinction
between our faith and your ethics and metaphysics,

between our piety and what you call morality. This is

what I would attain by this digression. I wished to throw

some light on the conception that is dominant among you.
That being done, I now return.

|
|

:

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 35

Y In order to make quite clear to you what is the original

and characteristic possession of religion, it resigns, at once,
all claims on anything that belongs either to science or
morality. Whether it has been borrowed or bestowed it is
now returned. What then does your science of being, your
natural science, all your theoretical philosophy, in so far
as it has to do with the actual world, have for its aim ?
To know things, I suppose, as they really are; to show the
peculiar relations by which each is what it is; to determine
for each its place in the Whole, and to distinguish it rightly
from all else; to present the whole real world in its
mutually conditioned necessity ; and to exhibit the oneness
of all phenomena with their eternal laws. This is truly
beautiful and excellent, and I am not disposed to de-
preciate. Rather, if this description of mine, so slightly
sketched, does not suffice, I will grant the highest and most
exhaustive you are able to give.

And yet, however high you go; though you pass from the

laws to the Universal Lawgiver, in whom is the unity of all

things; though you allege that nature cannot be compre-
hended without God, I would still maintain that religion has
nothing to dowith this knowledge, and that, quite apart from
it, its nature can be known. Quantity of knowledge is not
Soantity of piety. Piety can gloriously display itself, both

‚with originality and individuality, in those to whom this

kind of knowledge is not original. They may only know it
as everybody does, as isolated results known in connection
with other things. The pious man must, in a sense, be a
wise man, but he will readily admit, even though you some-
what proudly look down upon him, that, in so far as he is
pious, he does not held his knowledge in the game way as you.

Let me interpret in clear words what most pious persons

only guess at and never know how to express, Were

you to set God as the apex of your science as the

foundation of all knowing as well as of all knowledge,

they would accord praise and honour, but it would not be

their way of having and knowing God. From their way,
D 2

36 SECOND SPEECH.

as they would readily grant, and as is easy enough to see,
knowledge and science do not proceed.
It is true that religion is essentially contemplative. You
would never call anyone pious who went about in impervious
stupidity, whose sense is not open for the life of the world.
But this contemplation is not turned, as your knowledge of
nature is, to the existence of a finite thing, combined with
and opposed to another finite thing. It has not even, like
your knowledge of God—if for once I might use an old
expression—to do with the nature of the first cause, in
itself and in its relation to every other cause and operation.
The, contemplation of the pious is the immediate conscious-

ness of the universal existence of all finite things, in and
through the Infinite, and Of all temporal things in and
| through the Eternal. Religion is to seek this and find it
in all that lives and moves ‚m all growth and change, in all
doing and suffering. If i > D have life and to know life in
immediate feeling, only as such an existence in the Infinite

and Eternal. Where this is found religion is satisfied,
where it hides itself there is for her unrest and anguish,
extremity and death. Wherefore it is a life in the infinite
| nature of the Whole, in the One and in the All, in God,
‚having and possessing all things in God, and God in all.
Yet religion is not knowledge and BEER either of the
world or of God. Without being knowledge, it recognizes
knowledge and science. In itself it is an affection, a
revelation of the Infinite in the finite, God being seen i in
it and it in God.

Similarly, what is the object of your ethics, of your
science of action? Does it not seek to distinguish precisely
each part of human doing and producing, and at the same
time to combine them into a whole, according to actual
relations? But the pious man confesses that, as pious, he
knows nothing about it. He does, indeed, contempla
human action, but it is not the kind of contemplation fro
which an ethical system takes its rise. Only one thing he

uw.

Pr 3

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 37

seeks out and detects, action from God, God’s activity
among men. If your ethics are right, and his piety as
well, be will not, it is. true, acknowledge any action as
excellent which is not embraced in your system. But to
know and to construct this system is your business, ye
learned, not his. If you will not believe, regard the case
of women. You ascribe to them religion, not only as an
adornment, but you demand of them the finest feeling for
distinguishing the things that excel: do you equally expect
them to know your ethics as a science?

It is the same, let me say at once, with action itself.
_ The artist fashions what is given him to fashion, by virtue
of his special talent. These talents are so different that
the one he possesses another lacks; unless someone,
against heaven’s will, would possess all. But when anyone
is praised to you as pious, you are not accustomed to ask
which of these gifts dwell in him by virtue of his piety.
The citizen—taking the word in the sense of the ancients,
not in its present meagre significance—regulates, leads, and
influences in virtue of his morality. But this is something
different from piety. Piety has also a passive side. While
morality always shows itself as manipulating, as self-
controlling, piety appears as a surrender, a submission to
be moved by the Whole that stands over against man.
Morality depends, therefore, entirely on the consciousness
of freedom, within the sphere of which all that it produces
falls. Piety, on the contrary, is not at all bound to this
side of life. In the opposite sphere of necessity, where
there is no properly individual action, it is quite as active
Wherefore the two are different. Piety does, indeed, linger
with satisfaction on every action that is from God, and
every activity that reveals the Infinite in the finite, and yet
itis not itself this activity. Only by keeping quite outside
the range both of science and of practice can it maintain
its proper sphere and character. Only when piety takes
its place alongside of science and practice, as a state

|

38 _ SECOND SPEECH.

an indispensable third, as their natural counterpart, not less’
in worth and splendour than either, will the common field
be altogether occupied and human nature on this side

complete. |

But pray understand me fairly. I do not mean that one
could exist without the other, that, for example, a man
might have religion and be pious, and at the same time be
immoral. That is impossible. But, in my opinion, it is
just as impossible to be moral or scientific without being
religious. But have I not said that religion can be had
without science? Wherefore, I have myself begun the
separation. But remember, I only said piety is not the
measure of science. Just as one cannot be truly scientific
without being pious, the pious man may not know at all,
but he cannot know falsely. His proper nature is not of
that subordinate kind, which, according to the old adage
that like is only known to like, knows nothing except
semblance of reality.

His nature is reality which knows reality, and where it
encounters nothing it does not suppose it sees something.
And what a precious jewel of science, in my view, is igno-
rance for those who are captive tosemblance. If you have
not learned it from my Speeches or discovered it for your-
selves, go and learn it from your Socrates. Grant me con-
sistency at least. With ignorance your knowledge will ever
be mixed, but the true and proper opposite of knowledge
is presumption of knowledge, By piety this presumption
is most certainly removed, for with it piety cannot exist.

Such a separation of knowledge and piety, and of action
and piety, do not accuse me of making. You are only
ascribing to me, without my deserving it, your own view
and the very confusion, as common as it is unavoidable,
which it has been my chief endeavour to show you in the
mirror of my Speech. Just because you do not acknow-
ledge religion as the third, knowledge and action are
so much apart that you can discover no unity, but believe

Sadana *

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 39

that right knowing can be had without right acting,
and vice versa. I hold that is it only in contemplation -.
that there is division. There, where it is necessary, you
despise it, and instead transfer it to life, as if in life itself
objects could be found independent one of the other. Con-
sequently you have no living insight into any of these
activities. Each is for you a part, a fragment. Because

you do not deal with life in a living way, your conception ah

bears the stamp of perishableness, and is altogether meagre,
True science is complete | vision ; true practice is culture

and art self-produced ; true religion i is sense and taste for ““

Niki Che

the Infinite. To wish to have true science or true practice mary
mm u

without religion, or to imagine it is possessed, 1 is obstinate,
arrogant delusion, and oeluahle error. It issues from the
unholy sense that would rather have a show of possession
by cowardly purloining than have secure possession by
demanding and waiting. What can man accomplish that is
worth speaking of, either in life or in art, that does not
arise in his own self from the influence of this sense for the
Infinite § ? Without it, how can anyone wish to comprehend
the world scientifically, or if, in some distinct talent, the
knowledge is thrust upon him, how should he wish to
exercise it ? What is all science, if not the existence of things
in you, in your reason? what is all art and culture if not
your existence in the things to which you 1 give measure,
form and order? And how can both: come _to life in you
except in so far as there lives ves immediately i in you the eternal
unity of J Reason and Nature, the universal existence > of all
finite things i in the Infinite 1

Wherefore, you 1 will find every ry truly learned man devout /“

and pious. Where you see science ‘without religion, be sure ye 7
it is transferred, learned up from another. It is sickly, ‚if fre
indeed it is not that empty appearance which serves neces-
sity and isno knowledge at all. And what else do you take
this deduction and weaving together of ideas to be, which
neither live nor correspond to any living thing ? Orin ethics,

+

40 SECOND SPEECH.

what else is this wretched uniformity that thinks it can
grasp the highest human life in a single dead formula?
The former arises because there is no fundamental feeling

7 of that living nature which everywhere presents variety and

individuality, and the latter because the sense fails to give
infinity to the finite by determining its nature and boun-
daries only from the Infinite. Hence the dominion, of the
mere notion ; hence the mechanical erections of your systems
instead of an organic structure ; hence the vain juggling

with analytical formulas, in ro: whether categorical or |

hypothetical, life will not be fettered.. Science is not your
calling, if you despise religion and fear to surrender your-
self to reverence and aspiration for the primordial. Hither
science must become as low as your life, or it must be
separated and stand alone, a division that precludes success.
If man is not one with the Eternal in the unity ( of intuition

| and feeling which is immediate, he. remains, in the unity of
consciousness which is derived, for ever apart. y

What, then, shall become of the highest utterance of the
speculation of our days, complete rounded idealism, if it do
not again sink itself in this unity, if the humility of religion
do not suggest to its pride another realism than that which
it so boldly and with such perfect right, subordinates to
itself ? It annihilates the Universe, while it seems to aim at
constructing it. It would degrade it to a mere allegory, to
a mere phantom of the one-sided limitation of its own empty
consciousness. Offer with me reverently a tribute to the
manes of the holy, rejected Spinoza.’ The high World-
Spirit pervaded him; the Infinite was his beginning and
his end ; the Universe was his only and his everlasting love.
In holy innocence and in deep humility he beheld himself
mirrored in the eternal world, and perceived how he also
was its most worthy mirror. He was full of religion, full

of the Holy Spirit. Wherefore, he stands there alone and —
unequalled ; master in his art, yet without disciples and’

without citizenship, sublime above the profane tribe.

peer Spas

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 41

Why should I need to show that the same ‘applies to
art? Because, from the same causes, you have here also
a thousand phantoms, delusions, and mistakes. In place
of all else I would point to another example which should
be as well known to you all. I would point in silence—for
pain that is new and deep has no words. It is that superb
youth, who has too early fallen asleep, with whom every-
thing his spirit touched became art. His whole contem-
plation of the world was forthwith a great poem. Though
he had scarce more than struck the first chords, you must
associate him with the most opulent poets, with those
select spirits who are as profound as they are clear and
vivacious. See in him the power of the enthusiasm and
the caution of a pious spirit, and acknowledge that when
the philosophers shall become religious and seek God like
Spinoza, and the artists be pious and love Christ like
Novalis, the great resurrection shall be celebrated for both
worlds?

But, in order that you may understand what I mean by
this unity and difference of religion, science and art, we
shall endeavour to descend into the inmost sanctuary of
life. There, perhaps, we may find ourselves agreed. There
alone you discover the original relation of intuition and
feeling from which alone this identity and difference is to
be understood. But I must direct you to your own selves.
You must apprehend a living movement. You must know
how to listen to yourselves before your own consciousness..
At least you must be able to reconstruct from your con-
sciousness your own state. What you are to notice is the |
rise of your consciousness and not to reflect upon some-
thing already there. Your thought can only embrace what
is sundered. Wherefore as soon as you | have made any

cation or of contemplation, you have already begun tw
separate. It is impossible, therefore, to adduce any definite
example, for, as soon as anything is an example, what I

42 SECOND SPEECH.

wish to indicate is already past. Only the faintest trace
of the original unity could then be shown. Such as it is,
however, I will not despise it, as a preliminary.

Consider how you delineate an object. Is there not both
a stimulation and a determination by the object, at one
and the same time, which for one particular moment forms
your existence? The more definite your image, the more,
in this way, you become the object, and the more you lose
yourselves, But just because you can trace the growing
preponderance of one side over the other, both must have
been one and equal in the first, the original moment that
has escaped you. Or sunk in yourselves, you find all that
you formerly regarded as a disconnected manifold com-
pacted now indivisibly into the one peculiar content of
your being. Yet when you give heed, can you not see
as it disappears, the image of an object, from whose
influence, from whose magical contact this definite con-
sciousness has proceeded? The more your own state
sways you the paler and more unrecognizable your image
becomes. The greater your emotion, the more you are
absorbed in it, the more your whole nature is concerned to
retain for the memory an imperishable trace of what is
necessarily fleeting, to carry over to what you may engage in,
its colour and impress, and so unite two moments into a dura-
tion, the less you observe the object that caused it. But just
because it grows pale and vanishes, it must before have been
nearer and clearer. Originally it must have been one and
the same with your feeling. But, as was said, these are mere
traces. Unless you will go back on the first beginning of
this consciousness, you can scarcely understand them.

And suppose you cannot? Then say, weighing it
quite generally and originally, what is every act of your
life In i itself and without distinction from other acts.
What is is it merely as act, as movement ? Is it not the

time in the Whole? It is an ne: to return into

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 43

the Whole, and to exist for oneself at the same time.
These are the links from which the whole chain is made.
Your whole life is such an existence for self in the Whole.
How now are you in the Whole? By your senses. And
how are you for yourselves ?_ By. the unity « of your self-
consciousness, which is given chiefly in the an of
comparing. the varying degrees of sensation. How both
can only rise together, if both together fashion every act of
life, is easy to see. You become sense and the Whole
becomes object. Sense "and object mingle and unite, then
each returns to its place, and the object rent from sense
is a perception, and you rent from the object are for your-
selves, a feeling. It is this earlier moment I mean, which
you always experience yet never experience. The phe-
nomenon of your life is just the result of its constant
departure and return, It is scarcely in time at all, so
swiftly it passes ; it can scarcely be described, so_ little
does it properly exist. Would that I could hold it fast and
refer to it your commonest as well as your highest activities.

Did I venture to compare it, seeing I cannot describe
it, I would say it is fleeting and transparent as the vapour
which the dew breathes on blossom and fruit, it is bashful
and tender as a maiden’s kiss, it is holy and fruitful
as a bridal embrace. Nor is it merely like, it is all this.
It is the first contact of the universal life with an indivi-
dual. It Alls’no time and fashions nothing palpable. It
is the holy wedlock of the Universe with the incarnated
Reason for a creative, productiveembrace. It isimmediate,
raised above all error and misunderstanding. You lie
directly on the bosom of the infinite world. In that
moment, you are its soul. Through one part of-your
nature you feel, as your own, all its powers and its endless
life. In that moment it is your body, you pervade, as
your own, its muscles and members and your thinking
and forecasting set its inmost nerves in motion. In this
way every living, original movement in your life is first

eee

44 | SECOND SPEECH.

received. Among the rest it is the source of every
religious ¢ emotion. But it is not, as I said, even a moment,
The incoming 0 of existence to us, by this immediate union,
at once stops a as soon as it reaches, consciousness, Hither
the intuition displays itself more vividly and clearly, like
the figure of the vanishing mistress to the eyes of her
lover; or feeling issues from your heart and overspreads
your whole being, as the blush of shame and love over the
face of the maiden. At length your consciousness is
finally determined as one or other, as intuition or feeling.
Then, even though you have not quite surrendered to this
division and lost consciousness of your life as a unity,
there remains nothing but the knowledge that they were
originally one, that they issued simultaneously from the
fundamental relation of your nature. Wherefore, it is in
this sense true what an ancient sage has taught you, that
all knowledge is recollection. It is recollection of what
is outside of all time, and is therefore justly to be placed
at the head of all temporal things.

And, as it is with intuition and feeling on the one hand, so
it is with knowledge which includes both and with activity
on the other. Through the constant play and mutual influ-
ence of these opposites, your life expands and has its place in
time. Both knowledge and activity are a desire to be iden-
tified with the Universe through an object. If the power of
the objects preponderates, if, as intuition or feeling, it enters
and seeks to draw you into the circle of their existence, it
is always a knowledge. If the preponderating power is on
your side, so that you give the impress and reflect. your-
selves in the objects, it is activity in the narrower sense,
external working. Yet it is only as you are stimulated
and determined that you can communicate yourselves to
things. In founding or establishing anything in the world
you are only giving back what that original act of fellow-

ship has wrought in you, and similarly everything the
world fashions in you must be by the same act. One must

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 45

mutually stimulate the other. Only in an interchange of

———n

Knowing and acti activity can your life consist. A peaceful
existence, wherein one side did not stimulate the other,
- would not be your life. It would be that from which it first
developed, and into which it will again disappear. |
There then you have the three things about which my
Speech has so far turned,—perception, feeling and activity,
and you now understand what I mean when I say they are
not identical and yet are inseparable. Take what belongs
‚to each class and consider it by itself. You will find that
those moments in which you exercise power over things and
impress yourselves upon them, form what you call your
practical, or, in the narrower sense, your moral life; again
the contemplative moments, be they few or many, in which
things produce themselves in you as intuition, you will
doubtless call your scientific life. Now can either series
alone form a human life? Would it not be death? If
each activity were not stimulated and renewed by the other,
would it not be self-consumed? Yetthey are not identical.
If you would understand your life and speak comprehensi-
bly of it, they must be distinguished. As it stands with
these two in respect of one another, it must stand with the
third in respect of both. How then are you to name this
third, which is the series of feeling? What life will it
form? The religious as I think, and as you will not be able
to deny, when you have considered it more closely.

The chief point in my Speech is now uttered. This is the
peculiar sphere which I would assign to religion—the
whole of it, and nothing more. Unless you grant it, you
must either prefer the old confusion to clear analysis, or
produce something else, I know not what, new and
quite wonderful. Your feeling is piety,\in_ so far as it ex-
presses, in the manner described, the being and life com-
mon to you and to the All. ont fooling i piety in ah in so far
as as it is the result of the operation of God in _you_by means

‘ofthe operation of the world upon you. This series is not

46 SECOND SPEECH.

made up either of perceptions or of objects of perception,
either of works or operations or of different spheres of
operation, but purely of sensations and the influence of all
that lives and moves around, which accompanies them
and conditions them. These feelings are exclusively the
elements of religion, and none are excluded. There is no
sensation that is not pious,{éxcept it indicate some diseased
and impaired state of the life, the influence of which will
not beconfined to religion. Wherefore, it follows that ideas
and principles are all foreign to religion, This truth
we. here come upon for the second time. If ideas and prin-
ciples are to be anything, they must belong to knowledge
which is a different department of life from religion. 7
Now that we have some ground beneath us, we are in a
better position to inquire about the source of this con-
fusion. May there not be some reason for this constant
connection of principles and ideas with religion? In the
same way is there not a cause for the connection of
action with religion? Without such an inquiry it would
be vain to proceed farther. The misunderstanding would |
be confirmed, for you would change what I say into ideas
and begin seeking for principles in them. Whether you
will follow my exposition, who can tell? What now is to
hinder that each of the functions of life just indicated
should not be an object for the others? Or does it not
rather manifestly belong to their inner unity and equality
that they should in this manner strive to pass over into one
another? So atleast it seems to me. Thus, as a feeling
person, you can become an object to yourself and you can con-
template your own feeling. Nay, you can, as a feeling person,
become an object for yourself to operate upon and more and
more to impress your deepest nature upon. Would you now
call the general description of the nature of your feelings
that is the product of this contemplation a principle, and
the description of each feeling, an idea, you are cer-
tainly free to do so. And if you call them religious
principles and ideas, you are not in error. But do not

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. ae

forget that this is scientific treatment of religion, know-
ledge about it, and not religion itself. |
Nor can the description be equal to the thing described.

‘ The feeling may dwell in many sound and strong, as for

example in almost all women, without ever having been
specially a matter of contemplation. Nor may you say
religion is lacking, but only knowledge about religion.
Furthermore, do not forget what we have already estab-
lished, that this contemplation presupposes the original
activity. It depends entirely upon it. If the ideas and
principles are not from reflection on a man’s own feeling,
they must be learned by rote and utterly void. Make sure
of this, that no man is pious, however perfectly he under-
stands these principles and conceptions, however much he
believes he possesses them in clearest consciousness, who
cannot show that they have originated in himself and, being
the outcome of his own feeling, are peculiar to himself.
Do not present him to me as pious, for he is not. His soul
is barren in religious matters, and his ideas are merely

‚supposititious children which he has adopted, in the secret

feeling of his own weakness. As for those who parade
religion and make a boast of it, I always characterize them
as unholy and removed from all divine life. One has concep-
tions of the ordering of the world and formulas to express
them, the other has prescriptions whereby to order himself
and inner experiences to authenticate them. The one weaves
his formulas into a system of faith, and the other spins out of
his prescriptions a scheme of salvation. It being observed
that neither has any proper standing ground without feeling,
strife ensues as to how many conceptions and declarations,
how many precepts and exercises, how many emotions and
sensations must be accepted in order to conglomerate a
sound religion that shall be neither specially cold nor enthu-
siastic, dry nor shallow. O fools, and slow of heart! They

. do not know that all this is mere analysis of the religious

sense, which they must have made for themselves, if it is
to have any meaning.

48 SECOND SPEECH.

But if they are not conscious of having anything to
analyze, whence have they those ideas and rules? They
have memory and imitation, but that they have religion do
not believe. They have no ideas of their own from which
formulas might be known, so they must learn them by rote, .
and the feelings which they would have accompanying
them are copies, and like all copies, are apt to become cari-
catures. And out of this dead, corrupt, second-hand stuff,
a religion is to be concocted! The members and Juices of
an organized body can be dissected ; but take these elements
now and mix them and treat them in every possible way ;
and will you be able to make heart’s blood of them?
Once dead, can it ever again move in a living body?
Such restoration of the products of living nature out of its
component parts, once divided, passes all human skill, and,
just as little, would you succeed with religion, however
completely the various kindred elements be given from
without. From within, in their original, characteristic
form, the emotions of piety must issue. They must be in-
dubitably your own feelings, and not mere stale descriptions
of the feelings of others, which could at best issue in a
wretched imitation.

Now the religious ideas which form those systems can and
ought to be nothing else than such a description, for religion
cannot and will not originate in the pure impulse to know.
What we feel and are conscious of in religious emotions is
not the nature of things, buttheir. operation upon us. What
you may know or r believe@bout the nature of things is far
beneath the sphere of religion. The Universe is ceaselessly
active and at every moment is revealing itself tous. Every
form it has produced, ‚everything to which, from the fulness
of its life, it has given a separate existence, every occurrence
scattered from its fertile bosom is an operation of the
Universe upon us. Now religion is to take up into our
lives and to submit to be swayed by them, each of these
influences and their consequent emotions, not by themselves

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 49

but as a part of the Whole, not as limited and in opposition

to (0 other things, but as an exhibition of the Infinite in our lifé.»

Anything beyond this, any effort to penetrate into the nature
and substance of things is no longer religion, but seeks to be
a science of some sort.

On the other hand, to take what are meant as descriptions
of our feelings for a science of the object, in some way the
revealed product of religion, or to regard it as science and
religion at the same time, necessarily leads to mysticism
and vain mythology. For example, it was religion when
the Ancients, abolishing the limitations of time and space,
regarded every special form of life throughout the whole
world as the work and as the kingdom of a being who in
this sphere was omnipresent and omnipotent, because one
peculiar way in which the Universe operates was present as
a definite feeling, and they described it after this fashion.
It was religion when they assigned a peculiar name and
built a temple to the god to whom they ascribed any help-
ful occurrence whereby in an obvious, if accidental, way,
the laws of the world were revealed, because they had com-
prehended something as a deed of the Universe, and after
their own fashion set forth its connection and peculiar
character. It was religion when they rose above the rude
iron age, full of flaws and inequalities, and sought again the
golden age on Olympus in the joyous life of the gods,
because beyond all change and all apparent evil that results
only from the strife of finite forms, they felt the ever-stir-
ring, living and serene activity of the World and the World-
Spirit. But when they drew up marvellous and complex
genealogies of the gods, or when a later faith produced a
long series of emanations and procreations, it was not reli-
gion. Even though these things may have their source in
a religious presentation of the relation of 'the human and
the divine, of the imperfect and the perfect, they were, in
themselves, vain mythology, and, in respect of science,

ruinous mysticism. The sum total of religion is to feel
B

\

50 SECOND SPEECH.

that, in its highest unity, all that moves us in feeling is one ;
to feel 1 that aught single and particular i is only possible by
means of this unity ; - to feel, that is to say, that our being
and living i is a being and living in and through God. But
it is not necessary that the Deity should be presented as as
also one distinct object. To many this view is necessary,
and to all it is welcome, yet it is always hazardous and
fruitful in difficulties. It is not easy to avoid the appear-
ance of making Him susceptible of suffering like other
objects. It is only one way of characterizing God, and,
from the difficulties of it, common speech will probably
never rid itself. But to treat this objective conception of
God just as if it were a perception, as if apart from His
operation upon us through the world the existence of God
before the world, and outside of the world, though for the
world, were either by or in religion exhibited as science is,
so far as religion is concerned, vain mythology.® What is»
only a help for presentation is treated as a reality. ‚It is
a misunderstanding very easily made, but it is quite outside
the peculiar territory of religion.

From all this you will at once perceive how the question,
whether religion is a system or not, is to be treated. It
admits of an entire negative, and also of a direct affirmative,
in a way that perhaps you scarce expected. Religion is
certainly a system, if you mean that it is formed. according
to an inward and necessary connection. That the religious
sense of one e person } is moved in one way, and that of another
in another is not : pure ac accident, as if the emotions formed
ho whole, as ifany emotions might be caused in the same
individual by the same object. Whatever occurs any-
where, whether among many or few as a peculiar and
distinct kind of feeling is in itself complete, and by its
nature necessary. What you find as religious emotions
among Turks or Indians, cannot equally appear among
Christians. The essential oneness of religiousness spreads
itself out in a great variety of provinces, and again, in each

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 51

province it contracts itself, and the narrower and smaller
the province there is necessarily more excluded as incom-
patible and more included as characteristic. Christianity,
for example, is a whole in itself, but so is any of the divisions
that may at any time have appeared init, down to Pro-
testantism and Catholicism in modern times. Finally, the
piety of each individual, whereby he is rooted in the greater
unity, isa whole by itself. It is a rounded whole, based on
his peculiarity, on what you call his character, of which it
forms one side. Religion thus fashions itself with endless

—

variety, down even to the single personality.

Each form again is a whole and capable of an endless
number of characteristic manifestations, You would not
have individuals issue from the Whole in a finite way, each
being at a definite distance from the other, so that one
might be determined, construed and numbered from the
others, and its characteristics be accurately determined in a

conception ? Were I to compare religion in this respect MW

with anything it would be with music, which indeed is other-
wise closely connected with it. Music is one great whole;
it is a special, a self-contained revelation of the world. Yet
the music of each people is a whole by itself, which again is
divided into different characteristic forms, till we come to
the genius and style of theindividual. Each actual instance
of this inner revelation in the individual contains all these
unities. Yet while nothing is possible for a musician,
except in and through the unity of the music of his people,
and the unity of music generally, he presents it in the charm
of sound with all the pleasure and joyousness of boundless
caprice, according as his life stirs in him, and the world
influences him. In the same way, despite the nece ssary
elements in its structure, religion is, in its individual mani-
festations v whe ereby it _displays itself immediately in life,
from nothing farther removed than from all semblance of
compulsion or limitation. In life, the necessary element is
taken up, taken up into freedom, Each emotion appears as
gE 2

)
* .
Pi ho 4

V/s

52 SECOND SPEECH.

the free self-determination of this very disposition, and
mirrors one passing moment of the world.

It would bé impious to demand here something held in
constraint, something limited and determined from without.
If anything of this kind lies in your conception of system
then you must set it quite aside. A system of perceptions
and feelings you may yourselves see to be somewhat mar-
vellous. Suppose now you feel something. Is there not at
the same time an accompanying feeling or thought—make
your own choice—that you would have to feel in accordance
with this feeling, and not otherwise were but this or that
object, which does not now move you, to be present? But
for this immediate association your feeling would be at an
end, and a cold calculating and refining would take its place.
Wherefore it is plainly. an error to assert that it belongs
to religion, to be conscious of the connection of its separate
manifestations, not only to have it within, and to develope
it from within, but to see it described and to comprehend it
from without, and it is presumption to consider that, with-
out it, piety is poverty-stricken. The truly pious are not
disturbed in the simplicity of their way, for they give
little heed to all the so-called religious systems that have
been erected in consequence of this view.

Poor enough they are too, far inferior to the theories
about music, defective though they be. Among those syste-
matizers there is less than anywhere, a devout watching
and listening to discover in their own hearts what they are
to describe. They would rather reckon with symbols, and
complete a designation which is about as accidental as the
designation of the stars. It is purely arbitrary and never
sufficient, for something new that should be included, is
always being discovered, and a system, anything permanent
and secure, anything corresponding to nature, and not the
result of caprice and tradition, is not to be found in it.
The designation, let the forms of religion be ever so inward
and seif-dependent, must be from without. Thousands

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 53

might be moved religiously in the same way, and yet each,
led, not so much by disposition, as by external circum-
stances, might designate his feeling by different symbols,”
Furthermore, those systematizers are less anxious to
present the details of religion than to subordinate them
one to the other, and to deduce them from a higher.
Nothing is of less importance to religion, for it knows
nothing of deducing and connecting. There is no single

fact in it that can be called original and chief, Its facts

are one and: all immediate. Without dependence on on any
other, each exists for itself. True, a special type of religion
is constituted by one definite kind and manner of feeling,
but it is mere perversion to call it a principle, and to treat
it as if the rest could be deduced from it. This distinct
form of a religion is found, in the same way, in every
single ‘element of religion, Hach expression of feeling
bears on it immediately this peculiar impress. It cannot
show itself without it, nor be comprehended without it.
Everything is to be found immediately, and not. proved
from something else. Generals, which include particulars,
combination and connection belong to another sphere, if
they rest on reality, or they are merely a work of phantasy
and caprice. Every man may have his own regulation and
his own rubrics. What is essential _ can. neither _gain nor
losé ther 'eby. _ Consequently, the man who truly knows the
nature of his 1 religion, will give a very subordinate place to
all apparent connection of details, and will not sacrifice the
smallest for the sake of it.

By taking the opposite course, the marvellous thought
has arisen of a universality of one religion, of one single
form which is true, and in respect of which all others
are false. Were it not that misunderstanding must be
guarded against, I would say that it is only by such
deducing and connecting that such a comparison as true
and false, which is not peculiarly appropriate to religion,
has ever been reached. It only applies where we have to

54 SECOND SPEECH.

do with ideas. Elsewhere the negative laws of your logic
are not | in place. All is immediately true 1 in religion, for

AN that is religious is good, for it is only Tann
as it expresses a common higher life. But the whole
circumference of religion is infinite, and is not to be com-
prehended under one form, but only under the sum total
of all forms. / It is infinite, not merely because any single
religious organization has a limited horizon, and, not
being able to embrace all, cannot believe that there is
nothing beyond; but more particularly, because everyone
is a person by himself, and is only to be moved in his own
way, so that for everyone the elements of religion have
most characteristic differences. Religion is infinite, not only
because something new is ever being produced in time,
by the endless relations both active and passive between
different minds and the same limited matter; not only
because the capacity for religion is never perfected, but is
ever being developed anew, is ever being more beautifully
reproduced, is ever entering deeper into the nature of man;
but religion is infinite on all sides. As the knowledge of
its eternal truth and infallibility accompanies knowledge,
the consciousness of this infinity accompanies religion. It is
the very feeling of religion, and must therefore accompany
everyone that really has religion, He must be conscious
that his religion is only part of the whole; that about the
same circumstances there may be views and sentiments
quite different from his, yet just as pious; and that there
may be perceptions and feelings belonging to other modifica-
tions of religion, for which the sense may entirely fail him.

You see how immediately this beautiful modesty, this
friendly, attractive forbearance springs from the nature
of religion. How unjustly, therefore, do you reproach
religion with loving persecution, with being malignant,

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 55

with overturning society, and making blood flow like
water. Blame those who corrupt religion, who flood it
with an army of formulas and definitions, and seek to
cast it into the fetters of a so-called system. What is it in
religion about which men have quarrelled and made parties
and kindled wars? About definitions, the practical some-
times, the theoretical always, both of which belong else-
where. Philosophy, indeed, seeks to bring those who
would know to a common knowledge. Yet even philo-
sophy leaves room for variety, and the more readily the
better it understands itself. But religion does not, even
once, desire to bring those who believe and feel to one
belief and one feeling. Its endeavour is to open in those
who are not yet ‘capable of religious emotions, the sense for
the unity of the original source of life. But just because
each seer is a new priest, a new mediator, a new organ, he
flees wi “with repugnance the bald_uniformity_which would
again destroy this divine abundance.

This miserable love of ate ER what is strange,
often without any patient examination of its claims, because,
were it to receive its place, the closed ranks would he de-
stroyed, and the beautiful coherence disturbed. There is
the seat of the art and love of strife. War must be carried
on, and persecution, for by thus relating detail to finite
detail, one may destroy the other, while, in its immediate
relation to the Infinite, all stand together in their original
genuine connection, all is one andallis true. These syste-
matizers, therefore, have caused it all. Modern Rome, god-
less but consequent, hurls anathemas and ejects heretics.)
Ancient Rome, truly pious, and, in a high style religious,
was hospitable to every god. The adherents of the dead
letter which religion casts out, have filled the world with
clamour and turmoil.

Seers of the Infinite have ever been quiet souls, They |
abide alone with themselves and the Infinite, or if they do |
look around them, grudge to no one who understands the

56 SECOND SPEECH.

--

mighty word his own peculiar way. By means of this wide
vision, this feeling of the Infinite, they are able to look
beyond their own sphere. There is in religion such a
capacity for unlimited manysidedness in judgment and in
contemplation as is nowhere else to be found. I will not
except even morality and philosophy, not-at least so much
of them as remains after religion is taken away. Let me
appeal to Ai own experience. Does notevery other object
whereto man’s thinking and striving are directed, draw
around him a narrow circle, inside ofwhich all that is highest
for him is enclosed, and outside of which all appears common
and unworthy? The man who only thinks methodically,
and acts from principle and design, and will accomplish this
or that in the world, unavoidably circumscribes himself, and
makes everything that does not forward him an object of
antipathy. Only when the free impulse of seeing, and of
living is directed towards _ the Infinite and goes into the
Infinite, is the mind set in unbounded liberty. Religion
alone rescues it from the heavy fetters of opinion a and desire.
For it, all that is is necessary, all that can be is an indis-
pensable image of the Infinite. In this respect, it is all
worthy of preservation and contemplation, however much,
in other respects, and in itself, it is to be rejected. Toa
pious mind religion makes everything holy, even unholiness
and commonness, whether he comprehends it or does not
comprehend it, whether it is embraced in his system of
thought, or lies outside, whether it agrees with his peculiar
mode of acting or disagrees. Religion is the natural and
sworn foe of all narrowmindedness, and of all onesidedness.

These charges, therefore, do not touch religion. They
rest upon the confusion between religion and that know-
ledge which belongs to theology. It is a knowledge,
whatever be its value, and is to be always distinguished
from religion. Just as inapplicable are the charges you
have made in respect of action. Something of this I have
already touched upon, but let us take a general glance at

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 57

it in order to set it entirely aside, and to show ‘you exactly
what I mean. Two things must be carefully distinguished.
In the first place, you charge religion with causing not
infrequently in the social, civil, and moral life, improper,
horrible, and even unnatural dealings. I will not demand
proof that these actions have proceeded from pious men.
I will grant it provisionally. But in the very utterance of
your accusation, you separate religion and morality. Do
you mean then that religion is immorality, or a branch of
it? Scarcely, for your war against it would then be of
quite another sort, and you would have to make success in
vanquishing religion a test of morality. With the excep-
tion of afew who have shown themselves almost mad in
their mistaken zeal, you have not yet taken up this posi-
tion. Or do you only mean that piety is different from
morality, indifferent in respect of it, and capable therefore
of accidentally becoming immoral? Piety and morality can
be considered apart, and so far they are different. As
I have already admitted and asserted, the one is based on
feeling, the other on action. But how, from this opposi-
tion do you come to make religion responsible for action?
Would it not be more correct to say that such men were

not moral enough, and had they been, they might have
been quite as pious without harm? If you are seeking
progress—as doubtless you are—where two faculties that
should be equal have become unequal, it is not advisable
to call back the one in advance. It would be better to
urge forward the laggard.

Lest you should think I am merely quibbling, consider
that religion by itself does not urge men to activity at all.
If you could imagine it implanted in man quite alone, it
would produce neither these nor any other deeds. The.
man, according to what we have said, would not act, he
would only feel. Wherefore, as you rightly complain, there
have been many most religious men in whom the proper im-
pulses to action have been wanting, and morality been too

58 SECOND SPEECH.

much in the background, who have retired from the world
and have betaken themselves in solitude to idle contem-
plation. Religion, when isolated and morbid, is capable of
such effects, but not of cruel and horrible deeds. In this
way, your accusation can be turned into praise. |
However different the actions you blame may be, they
have this in common, that they all seem to issue immediately
from one single impulse. Whether you call this special
feeling religious or not, I am far from disagreeing with you
when you so constantly blame it. Rather I praise you the
more thorough and impartial you are. Blame also, I pray
you, not only where the action appears bad, but still more
where it has a good appearance. When action follows a
single impulse, it falls into an undue dependence and is far
too much under the influence of the external objects that
work upon this one emotion. Feeling, whatever it be about,
if it is not dormant, is naturally violent. It is a com-
motion, a force to which action should not be subject and
from which it should not proceed. Quiet and discretion,
the whole impress of our nature should give action birth
and character, and this is as much required in common life as
in politics and art. But this divergence could only come
because the agent did not make his piety sufficiently evident.
Wherefore, it would rather appear that, if he had been
more pious he would have acted more morally. The
whole religious life consists of two elements, that man
surrender himself to the Universe and allow himself to be
influenced by the side of it that is turned towards him is one
, part, and that he transplant this contact which is one definite
feeling, within, and take it up into the inner unity of his
life and being, is the other. The religious life is nothing
else than the constant renewal of this proceeding. When,
therefore, anyone is stirred, in a definite way, by the
World, is it his piety that straightway sets him to such
working and acting as bear the traces of commotion and
disturb the pure connection of the moral life? Impossible.

ni ..

THE NATURE OF terranes OWN. 59

On the contrary, his piety invites him to enjoy what he has
won, to absorb it, to combine it, to strip it of what is
temporal and individual, that it may no more dwell in him
as commotion but be quiet, pure and eternal. From this
inner unity, action springs of its own accord, as a natural
branch of life. As we agreed, activity is a reaction of
feeling, but the sum of activity should only be a reaction of
the sum of feeling, a and single actions should depend on
something quite different from. momentary feeling. Only
when each action is in its own connection and in its proper
place, and not when, dependently and slavishly, ib cor-
responds to one emotion, does it exhibit, in a free and
characteristic way, the whole inner unity of the spirit,

Consequently your charge does not touch religion. And,
if you are speaking of a morbid state of it, you are speak-
ing of what is quite general and is not in any way original
to religion nor specially seated in it, and from which
consequently nothing is to be concluded against religion
in particular. Religion is of course finite, and therefore
subject to imperfections, but it must be apparent to you
that, in a healthy state, man cannot be represented as
acting from religion or being driven to action by religion,
but piety and morality form each a series by itself and are
two different functions of one and the same life. But
while man does nothing from religion, he should do every-
thing with religion. Uninterruptedly, like a sacred music,
the religious feelings should accompany his active life.

That by this representation of religion I am neither
deceiving you nor myself, you can easily see, if you observe
that each feeling ii in proportion as it bears the character of
piety, is disposed to withdraw itself into the heart and
not break forth into deeds. Would not a pious person who
was right deeply moved find himself in great perplexity, or
even quite fail to understand you, if you asked him by
what particular action he proposed to give expression and
vent to his feeling? They are bad spirits and not good that

—

60 SECOND SPEECH.

take possession of man, and drive him. The legions of
angels with which the Father provided His Son, exercised
no power over Him. They had no call to help Him in
any doing or forbearing, but they poured serenity and
calm into a soul exhausted with doing and thinking. For
a little, in that moment when His whole power was roused
for action, these friendly spirits were lost to His view, but
again they hovered round Him in joyous throng and
served Him. But why do I direct you to instances and
speak in images? Because by starting from the separa-
tion which you make between religion and morality, and
following it closely, we have come back to their essential
unity in real life. This separation means corruption in the
one and weakness in the other ; and if one is not what it
should be, neither can be perfect.

There are, however, other actions you often speak of.
The distinct purpose of them is to produce religion.
Being of no importance for morality, they are not moral, and
being of no importance for sense, they are not immoral, but
they are nevertheless disastrous, because they accustom man
to attach himself to what is void and to value what is worth-
less. Let them be ever so inane and meaningless, they, far
too often, take the place of moral action or hide its absence.

I know what you mean. Spare me the long catalogue
of outward disciplines, spiritual exercises, privations, mortifi-
cations and the rest. All these things you accuse religion
of producing, and yet you cannot overlook the fact that the
greatest heroes of religion, the founders and reformers of
the church, have regarded them with great indifference.
There is a difference, I admit, but I believe that, in this
regard also, the subject I defend will justify itself.

First of all, let us understand what we are dealing
with. Itis with action as an exercise of feeling, not with
any symbolical or significant action meant to represent
feeling. We have already seen how those dogmas and
opinions that would join themselves more closely to

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 61

religion than is fitting, are only designations and de-
scriptions of feeling. In short, they are a knowledge
about feeling, and in no way an immediate _knowledge
about the o e operations « of t the Universe, that gaye rise to the
feeling. We saw also, how it necessarily resulted in evil,
when they were put in place of the feeling, of the proper
and original perception. Similarly this conducting and
‘exercising of feeling which often turns out so vain and
meaningless, is an acting at second-hand. Just as that
knowledge made feeling an object to be contemplated and
understood, this acting makes it an object to be operated
upon and cultivated. What value this kind of activity may
have, and whether it may not be as unreal as that kind of
knowing, I shall not here decide. In what sense man can
act upon himself and particularly upon his feeling is
difficult to determine, and needs to be well weighed. Can
it be the result of a personal resolve, or does it not rather
appear to be the business of the Whole, and therefore a
given product of life? But as I said, this does not belong
here, and I would rather discuss it with the friends of
religion than with you. So much, however, is certain, and
I grant it fully, that few errors are so disastrous as the
substitution of these disciplinary exercises of feeling for

the original feeling itself. Only, it is plainly an error into
which religious men could not fa

If you would recall that og quite similar is to be
found in morality, you would perhaps at once agree with me.
Men, as they say, lay down for themselves just such acting
upon their own acting, just such exercisings of morals, to
the end of self-improvement. It happens that these are
sometimes put in place of direct moral action, of goodness
and righteousness themselves, but you would not admit that
it is through moral men. Men do all kinds of things,
accepting them from one and transmitting them to another,
though they have no meaning or value for themselves.

These actions are always, however, to be understood as

62 | SECOND SPEECH.

being done to rouse, sustain and direct religious feeling.
Where the activity is self-produced and really has this
meaning, it manifestly rests on the man’s own feeling. A
special state of feeling of which the man is conscious, is pre-
supposed, a knowledge of his own inner life with its weak-
nesses and inequalities. It presupposes an interest, a higher
self-love directed to himself, as a morally feeling person,
as an essential part of the spiritual world. When this love
ceases, the action also must cease. By supplanting feeling,
it abolishes itself, and such an error could only arise among
those who are in their hearts hostile to piety.

For them such exercisings of feeling have a special worth,
as if they also had some of the hidden virtue, seeing they can
outwardly imitate what, in others, has a deep significance,
Consciously or unconsciously, they deceive themselves and
others with the appearance of a higher life which they do not
really have. Hither it is base hypocrisy or wretched super-
stition, and I willingly expose it to your condemnation. No
exercise of this kind is of any value, and we shall reject not
only what, regarded by itself, is manifestly void, unnatural and
perverted, but all that in this way arises, however specious.
Severe mortifications, dull renunciation of the beautiful,
empty phrases and usages and charities shall all be reckoned
at the same value. Every superstition shall be alike unholy.

But we must never confuse it with the well-meant
endeavours of pious souls. The difference is easy to
discern. Each religious person fashions his own asceticism
according to his need, and looks for no rule outside of
himself, while the superstitious person and the hypocrite
adhere strictly to the accepted and traditional, and are
zealous for it, as for something universal and holy. This
zeal is natural, for if they were expected to think out for
themselves, their own outward discipline and exercise,
their own training of the feelings, having regard to their
own personal state, they would be in an evil case, and their
inward poverty could be no longer hidden.

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 63

The most general, almost preliminary truths have long
delayed us. Theyshould have been understood of them- .
selves, but neither you, nor many who would at least wish
to be counted among you, understood the relation of
religion to the other branches of life. Wherefore, it was
necessary to drain off at once the sources of the commonest
misconceptions, that they might not afterwards retard us.
This having been done to the utmost of my ability, we

ye now, I hope, firm ground beneath us. We have
attached ourselves to that moment, which is never ‘directly
observed, but in which all the different “phenomena of life
fashion. themselves together, as in the buds of some plants
blossom and fruit are both enclosed. When, therefore, we
have asked where now among all ib _produces is religion
chiefly to be sought, we have found only one right and
consistent answer. Chiefly where the living contact of
man with the world fashions itselfasfeeling. These feelings
are the beautiful and sweet scented flowers of religion,
which, after the hidden activity opens, soon fall, but which
the divine growth ever anew produces from the fulness of:
life. A climate of paradise is thus created in which no
penuriousness disturbs the development, and no rude
surrounding injures the tender lights and fine texture of its
flowers. To this I would now conduct you, your.vision
having been purified and prepared.

First of all, then, follow me to outward nature, which is
to many the first and only temple of the Godhead. In
virtue of its peculiar way of stirring the heart, it is held
to be the inmost sanctuary of religion. At present, how-
ever, this outward nature, although it should be more, is
little else ‘than the outer court, for the view with which
you next ‘oppose me is utterly to be repudiated. The
fear of the powers which rule in nature, which spare
nothing, which threaten the life and works of man, is
said to give the first feeling of the Infinite, or even to
be the sole basis of religion. Surely in that case you

64 SECOND SPEECH.

must admit that if piety came with fear it must go with
fear.

Let us then consider the matter. Manifestly the great
aim of all industry spent in cultivating the earth is to destroy
the dominion of the powers of nature over man, and to bring
all fear of them to an end. Already a marvellous amount
hasbeen done. The lightnings of Zeus terrify no more since
Hephaistus has prepared for us a shield against them; and
Hestia protects what she has won from Poseidon, even against
the angriest blows of his trident ; the sons of Ares unite with
those of Aisculapius to ward off the deadly arrows of Apollo.
Man is ever learning to resist and to destroy one of these
gods by means of the others, and is preparing soon, as con-
queror and lord, to be but a smiling spectator at this play.
Were fear then the ground of reverence for the powers of
nature, by thus mutually destroying one another, they
would gradually appear ordinary and common; for what
man has controlled or attempted to control, he can measure,
and what is measurable cannot stand in awful opposition to
him as the Infinite. The objects of religion would thus be
ever More and more unfaithful to it. But, are they?
Would not these gods, conducting themselves towards one
another as brethren and kinsfolk, and caring for man as the
youngest son of the same Father, be just as zealously wor-
shipped? If you are still capable of being filled with rever-
ence for the great powers of nature, does it depend on your
security or insecurity? When you stand under your light-
ning conductors, have you, perhaps, a laugh ready wherewith
tomock the thunder? Is not nature protecting and sustain-
ing quite as much an object of adoration? Or, consider it
in this way. Does the great and infinite alone threaten
man’s existence and oppose his working? Does he not
also suffer from much that is small and paltry, which,
because it cannot be definitely comprehended or fashioned
into something great, you call accident and the accidental ?
Has this ever been made an object of religion and been

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 65

worshipped? If you have such a small conception of the
Fate of the Ancients, you must have understood little of
their poetic piety. Under this dread Fate the sustaining
powers were as much embraced as the destructive. Very
different from that slavish fear, to banish which was a credit
and a virtue, was the holy reverence for Fate, the rejection,
of which, in the best and most cultured times of Antiquity,
was accounted, among better disposed persons, absolute
recklessness? Such a sacred reverence I will readily ac-
knowledge as the first element of religion, but the fear you
mean is not only not religion itself, it is not even prepara-
tory or introductory. If it should be praised, it must be
for urging men, by the desire to be rid of it, into earthly
fellowship in the state. But piety first begins when it is
put aside, for the aim of all religion is to love the World-
Spirit’? and joyfully to regard his working, and fear is not
in love. :

But that joy in Nature, which so many extol, is just as
little truly religious. I almost hate to speak of their
doings when they dart off into the great, glorious world to
get for themselves little impressions: how they inspect the
delicate markings and tints of flowers, or gaze at the magic
play of colours in the glowing evening sky, and how they
admire the songs of the birds on a beautiful country-side.
They are quite full of admiration and transport, and will
have it that no instrument could conjure forth these sounds
and no brush attain this gloss and marking. But suppose
we take their course and subtilize after their fashion!
What is it that they do admire? Rear the plant in a dark
cellar, and, if you are successful, you can rob it of all these
beauties, without in the least degree altering its nature.
Suppose the vapour above us somewhat differently disposed ;
instead of that splendour, you would have before your eyes
one unpleasant grayness, and yet what you are contemplating
would be essentially the same. Once more, try to imagine
how the midday sun, the glare of which you cannot endure,

F

66 SECOND SPEECH.

already appears to the inhabitants of the East the glimmer-
ing twilight. Is it not manifest, then, when they have not. ,
the same sensation, that they have gone aftena mere void
appearance? But they do not believe in it merely as an
appearance; it is for them really true. They are in per-
plexity between appearance and reality, and what is so
doubtful cannot be a religious stimulus, and can call forth no
genuine feeling. Were they children who, without further
thinking and willing, without comparison and reflection,
received the light and splendour, their hearts being opened
for the world by the soul of the world, so that they are
stirred to pious feeling by every object; or were they sages
in whose clear intuition all strife between appearance and
reality is resolved, and who, therefore, undisturbed by these
refinements, can again be stirred like children, their joy
would be a real and pure feeling, a living impulse, a gladly
communicative contact between them and the world. If
you understand this better way, then you can say that this
also is a necessary and indispensable element of religion.
But do not present me that empty affected thing that sits
so loose and is but a wretched mask for their cold, hard
refinement, as an emotion of piety. In opposing religion,
do not ascribe to it what does not belong toit. Do not
scoff, as if man entered most easily into this sanctuary by
being debased to fear of the irrational, and by vain trifling
with transitory show, as if piety were easiest, and most
becoming to timid, weak, sensitive souls.

The next thing to meet us in corporeal nature is its —
material boundlessness, the enormous masses which are
scattered over illimitable space and which circulate in
measureless orbits. Many hold that the exhaustion of the
imagination, when we try to expand our diminished pictures
of them to their natural size, is the feeling of the greatness
and majesty of the Universe. This arithmetical amazement
which, just on account of their ignorance, is easiest to
awake in infants and ignoramuses, you are quite right in

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 67

finding somewhat childish and worthless. But would those
who are accustomed to take this view grant us that, when
these great orbits had not yet been calculated, when half
of those worlds were not discovered, nay, when it was not
yet known that these shining points were worlds, piety,
lacking one essential element, was necessarily poorer ?
Just as little can they deny that, in so far as it can be
conceived—and without that it means nothing for us—
the infinity of mass and number is only finite and the
mind can comprehend every infinity of this kind into short
formule, and reckon with them, as daily happens. But
they would certainly not grant that anything of their
reverence for the greatness and majesty of the, Universe is
lost through advancing education and skill. As soon, how-
ever, as we are in a position to compare these units, which
are our measure of size and motion, with those great world
units, this spell of number and mass must disappear. As
long as this feeling rests on difference of mass, it is merely
a feeling of personal incapacity, which is doubtless a
religious for feeling , but is not that glorious reverence, as ex-
alting as it is Sambi, which is the feeling of our relation
to the Whole. Neither a world operation too great for an
organization, nor anything beyond it from smallness, can
constitute this feeling, but it must be just as strong when
the operation is equal and conformable to our powers.

What moves us so wondrously is not the contrast between
small and great, but the essence of greatness, the external
law in virtue of which size and number in general first arose.
Life alone can work on us in a characteristic way, and not
what is captive to weight and in so fardead. The religious
sense corresponds not to the masses in the oute er world, but
to ) their eternal laws. Rise to the height of seeing how
these laws. equally embrace all things, the greatest and the
smallest, the world systems and the mote which floats in
the air, and then say whether you are not conscious of the
divine unity and the eternal immutability of the world.

r2

- 68 SECOND SPEECH.

By the most constant repetition, some elements in these
laws cannot escape even common perception. There is -
the order in which all movements return in the heavens
and on the earth, the recognized coming and going of all
organized forces, the perpetual trustworthiness of the rules
of mechanics, and the eternal uniformity in the striving of
plastic Nature. But, if it is allowable to make a com-
parison, this regularity gives a less great and lively
religious feeling than the sense of law in all difference.
Nor should this appear strange to you.

Suppose you are looking at a fragment of a great work
of art. Inthe separate parts of hist fragment you perceive
beautiful outlines and situations, complete and fully to be
understood without anything besides. Would not the
fragment then rather appear a work by itself than a part
of a greater work, and would you not judge that, if the
whole was wrought throughout in this style, it must lack
- breadth and boldness and all that suggests a great spirit ?
If a loftier unity is to be suspected, along with the general
tendency to order and harmony, there must be here and
there situations not fully explicable. Now the world is a
work of which you only see a part. Were this part per-
fectly ordered and complete in itself, we could be conscious
of the greatness of the whole only in a limited way.

You see that the irregularity of the world, so often
employed against religion, has really a greater value for
religion than the order which is first presented to us in our
study of the world and which is visible in a smaller part.
The perturbations in the course of the stars point to a
higher unity and a bolder combination than those we have
already discovered in the regularity of their orbits. The
anomalies, the idle sports of plastic Nature, compel us to
see that she handles her most definite forms with free, nay
capricious arbitrariness, with a phantasy the laws of which
only a higher standpoint can show. |

Wherefore, in the religion of the Ancients, only inferior

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 69

divinities and ministering virgins had the oversight of all
that recurred uniformly and had an already discovered
order, but the exceptions which were not understood, the
revolutions for which there was no law, were the work c£
the father of the gods. We also haye strange, dread,
mysterious .emotions,.when the imagination reminds us that
there is more in nature than we know. They are easy to
distinguish from the quiet and settled consciousness that
everything is involved in the most distant combinations
of the Whole, that every individual thing is is determined by
the yet unexplored general life. This consciousness is pro-
duced by what we understand in Nature, but I mean those
dim presentiments which are the same in all, even though,
as is right, only the educated seek to elucidate them and
change them into a more lively activity of perception. In
others, being comprehended in ignorance and misunder-
standing, they grow to a delusion which we call pure
superstition, under which, however, there manifestly lies
a pious shudder of which we shall not be ashamed.
Furthermore, consider how you are impressed by the
universal opposition of life and death. The sustained,
conquering power, whereby every living thing nourishes
itself, forcefully awakes the dead and enters it on a new
course by drawing it into its own life. On every side we
find provision prepared for all living, not lying dead, but
itself alive and everywhere being reproduced. With all
this multitude of forms of life, and the enormous mass of
material which each uses in turn, there is enough for all.
Thus each completes his course and succumbs to an inward
fate and not to outward want. What a feeling of endless
fulness and superabundant riches ! ! How are we impressed
by a universal paternal care and a childlike confidence that
without anxiety plays away sweet life in a full and abun-
dant world! Consider the lilies of the field, they sow not,
neither do they reap, yet your Heavenly Father feedeth
them, wherefore be not anxious. This happy view, this

70 SECOND SPEECH. ,

serene, easy mind was for one of the greatest heroes of
religion, the fair profit of a very limited and meagre com-
munion with nature. How much more should we win who
have been permitted by a richer age to go deeper !
Already we know something more of the universally dis-
tributed forces, the eternal laws, whereby individual things,
that is things which have their souls in themselves apart,
in a more definite boundary, in what we call bodies, are
fashioned and destroyed. See how attraction and repulsion,
everywhere and always active, determine everything ; and
how all difference and opposition are again resolved dato
a higher unity. Only in appearance, can anything finite
boast itself of a separate existence. See how all likeness is
concealed by being distributed in a _ thousand different
shapes. Nothing simple is to be found, but all is skilfully
connected and interwoven. _We would see and exhort all who
share in the culture of the age to observe, how, in this sense,
the Spirit of the World reveals itself as visibly, as completely,
in small as in great, and we would not stop with such a con-
sciousness of it as might be had anywhere and from any-
thing. Even without all the knowledge which has made
our century glorious, the World-Spirit showed itself to the
most ancient sages. Not only did they have, by intuition,
the first pure speaking image of the world, but there was
kindled in their hearts a love for nature and a joy in her,
that is for us still lovely and pleasing. Had this but
penetrated to the people, who knows what strong and lofty
way religion might have taken from the beginning? At
present it has penetrated to all who would be considered
cultured. Through the gradual operation of the fellowship
between knowledge and feeling, they have arrived at the
immediate feeling that there is nothing even in their own
nature that is not a work of this Spirit, an exhibition and
application of these laws. In virtue of this feeling, all that
touches their life becomes truly a world, a unity permeated
by the Divinity that fashions it. It is natural, therefore,

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 4

that there should be in them all, that love and joy, that
deep reverence for nature which made sacred the art and
life of Antiquity, which was the source of that wisdom, which ~
we have returned to and are at length beginning to commend
and glorify by fruits long delayed. Such a feeling of being
one with nature, of being quite rooted in it, so that in all
the changing phenomena of life, even in the change be-
tween life and death-itself, we might await all that should
befall us with approbation and peace, as merely the working
out of those eternal laws, would indeed be the germ of all
the religious feelings furnished by this side of existence. _
“But is it so easy to find original in nature the love and
resistance, the unity and peculiarity, whereby it isa Wrote
forus? J ust because our sense tends in quite another direc- *
tion, is there so little truly religious enjoymentof nature. The
sense of the Whole must be first found, chiefly within our
own minds, and from thence transferr ed to corporeal nature.
Wherefore the spirit lo for us not only the seat of religion
- put its nearest world! The Universe portrays itself in the
inner life, and then the corporeal i is comprehensible from
the spiritual. If the mind is to produce and sustain reli-
gion it must operate upon us as a world and as in a world.
Let me reveal a secret to you that lies almost hidden in
one of the oldest sources of poetry and religion. As long
as the first man was alone with himself and nature, the Deity
ruled over him and addressed him in various ways, but he did
not understand and answered nothing. His paradise was
beautiful, the stars shone down on him from a beautiful
' heaven, but there awoke in him no sense for the world.
Even from within, this sense was not developed. Still his
mind was stirred with longing for a world, and he collected
the animal creation before him, if perhaps out of them a
world might be formed. Then the Deity recognized that
the world would be nothing, as long as man was alone.
He created a helpmate for him. At length the deep-toned
harmonies awoke in him, and the world fashioned itself

72 SECOND SPEECH.

before his eyes. In flesh of his flesh, and bone of his bone,
he discovered humanity. In this first love he had a foretaste
of all love’s forms and tendencies—in humanity he found
the world. From this moment he was capable of seeing and
hearing the voice of the Deity, and even the most insolent
transgression of His laws did not any more shut him out
from intercourse with the Eternal Being.”

The history of us all is related in this sacred legend.
All is present in vain for those who set themselves alone.
In order to receive the life of the World-Spirit, and have
religion, man must first, in love, and through love, have
found humanity. Wherefore, humanity and religion are
closely and indissolubly united. A longing for love, ever
satisfied and ever again renewed, forthwith becomes reli-
gion. Each man embraces most warmly the person in
whom the world mirrors itself for him most clearly and
purely ; he loves most tenderly the person whom he believes
combines all he lacks of a complete manhood. Similarly
the pious feelings are most holy that express for him
existence in the whole of humanity, whether as blessed-
ness in attaining or of need in coming short.

Wherefore, to find the most glorious elements of religion,
let us enter upon the territory where you are in your pecu-
liar, your most loved home. Here your inner life had its
birth, here you see the goal of all your striving and doing
before your eyes, and here you feel the growth of your
powers whereby you are evermore conducted towards it.
Humanity itself is for you the true universe, and the rest is
[eat added in so far as it is related to it or forms its
surroundings. Even for me, this point of view suffices. |
Yet it has often pained me that, with all your interest in
humanity, and with all your zeal for it, you are always in
difficulties with it, and divided from it, and pure love cannot
become right prominent in you. Each of you in hisown way
harasses himself to improve it, and to educate it, and what
will not come to an issue you finally cast aside in dejection.

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 73

I make bold to say, that this also comes from your lack of
religion. You wish to work on humanity, and you select
men, individuals for contemplation. They displease you
vastly. Among the thousand possible causes, unques-
tionably that which is finest in itself, and which belongs to
- the best of you, is that you are, in your own way, far too
ethical. You take men singly, and you have an ideal of the
individual to which no one cotresponds. If you would begin |
with religion, you would have far more success, Ifyou would
only attempt to: exchange the objects of your working and
the objects of your contemplation! Work on individuals,
but rise in contemplation, on the wings of religion, to end-
less, undivided humanity. Seek this humanity in each
individual; regard the nature of eyery person as one
revelation of it, and of all that now oppresses you no trace
‘would remain. I at least boast myself of a moral dis-
position, I know how to value human excellence, and
commonness could almost overwhelm me with the un-
pleasant feeling of contempt, were it not that religion gives
me a great and glorious view of all.

Just consider what a consummate artist the Genius of
humanity is. It can make nothing that has not a nature |
of its own. As soon as it assays its brush, or sharpens its
pencil, there appear living and significant features. It
imagines and fashions countless forms. Millions wear the
costume of the time, and are faithful pictures of its neces-
sities and its tastes. In others there are memories of the
past, or presentiments of a distant future. Some are most
lofty and striking types of the fairest and divinest, others
resemble grotesques produced in the most original and
fleeting mood of a master. The common view, based on a
misunderstanding of the sacred words that there are vessels
of honour and vessels of dishonour, is not pious. Only by
comparing details could such an opposition appear to you.
You must not contemplate anything alone, you must rather.
rejoice in everything in its own place. All that we can be

74 | SECOND SPEECH.

conscious of at once, all, as it were, that stands on one
sheet, presents one movement of the complete working of .
the Whole, and belongs, as it were, to one great historical
picture. Would you make light of the chief groups that
give life and affluence to the Whole? Should not each
heavenly form be glorified in having a thousand others ©
that regard it and are related to it, bowing before it?
Indeed, there is more in this presentation than a mere
simile. Eternal humanity is unweariedly active, seeking to
step forth from its inward, mysterious existence into the.
light, and to present itself in the most varied way, in the
fleeting manifestation of the endless life. That is the
harmony of the Universe, the wondrous and unparalleled
unity of that eternal work of art. :
_ Being occupied in the outer court of morality, and there
only with elements, caring for details and satisfied with
them, and despising high religion, you slander its magnifi-
cence by your demands for a lamentable dismemberment.
This is sufficient to indicate your need, may you now recog-
nize it and satisfy it! Make search among all the circum-
stances in which the heavenly order portrays itself, and
perhaps some favourite passage of history may be a divine
sign to you, whereby. you may more easily recognize how
real the insignificant is, and how important for the Whole.
Then what you regard with coldness or contempt may draw
you with love. Or, allow yourselves to be pleased with an
old, rejected conception ; seek out among the holy men, in
whom humanity is pre-eminently revealed, someone to be
a mediator between your limited way of thinking, and the
eternal laws of the world. And when you ‘have found one
who, in a way you understand, by imparting himself,
strengthens the weak, and gives life to the dead, traverse
humanity, and let all that has hitherto seemed useless and
wretched be illuminated by the reflection of this new light.
What would the uniform repetition of even a highest ideal
be? Mankind, time and circumstances excepted, would be

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 75

identical. They would be the same formula with a different
co-efficient. What would it bein comparison with the end-
less variety which humanity does manifest? Take any
element of humanity, and you will find it in almost every
possible condition. You will not find it quite by itself, nor
quite combined with all other elements, but you will find all
possible mixtures between, in every odd and unusual com-
bination. And if you could think of unions you do not see,
this gap would be a negative revelation of the Universe, an
“ indication that, in the present temperature of the world, this
mixture is not possible, in the requisite degree. Your
imagination thus gives you a glimpse beyond the present
boundaries of humanity, and whether it be only a ray from
a vanished past, or an involuntary and unconscious prophecy
of the future, it is a real higher inspiration. And just as
this, that seems to come short of the requisite infinite
variety is not really too little, so what, from your stand-
point appears superfluous, is not really too miuch.

This oft-bewailed superfluity of the commonest forms of
humanity, ever returning unchanged in a thousand copies,
does not disturb the pious mind. The Eternal Mind com-
mands that the forms in which individuality is most difficult
to discern, should stand closest together, and even the finite
mind can see the reason why. And each has something of
its own, and no two are identical. In every life there is some
moment, like the coruscation of baser metals, when, by the
approach of something higher, or by some electric shock, it
surpasses itself and stands on the highest pinnacle of its possi-
bilities. For this moment it was created, in this moment it
fulfilled its purpose, and, after this moment its exhausted
vitality again subsides. ‘To call forth this moment in ordi-
nary souls and to contemplate them during it is a pleasure
to be envied, and to those who have not known it, the whole
existence of them must appear superfluous and despicable.

Yet the existence of such an ordinary soul has a double
meaning in respect of the Whole. If I arrest in thought

76 SECOND SPEECH.

the course of that unresting machinery whereby all that is
human is woven together and made interdependent, I see
that each individual in his inner nature is a necessary com-
plement of a complete intuition of humanity. One shows
me how any fragment, if only the plastic impulse of the
Whole still quickens it, can calmly progress, fashioning it-
self in graceful, regular forms; another how, from want of
a vivifying and combining warmth, the hardness of the
earthly material cannot be overcome; while, in a third, I
see how, in an atmosphere too violently agitated, the spirit
within is disturbed in its working, so that nothing comes
clearly and recognizably to light. One appears as the
rude and anifnal portion of mankind, stirred only by the
first ungainly motions of humanity; another is the pure
dematerialized spirit that, having been separated from all
that is base and unworthy, hovers with noiseless foot over
the earth. But everything between also has a purpose.
It shows how, in the minute detached phenomena of indi-
vidual lives, the different elements of human nature all
appear at every stage and in every manner. It is not
enough that among this countless multitude there . are
always a few at least who are the distinguished represen-
tatives of humanity, who strike different melodious chords
that require no further accompaniment, and no subsequent
explication, but who, in the one note, charm and satisfy
by their harmony the whole soul. But even the noblest only
presents mankind in one way and in one of its movements,
and in some sense everyone is a peculiar exhibition of
humanity and does the same thing, and were a single
figure to fail in the great picture, it would be impossible
to. comprehend it completely and perfectly. If now
every one is so essentially connected with that which is
the inner kernel of our own life, how can we avoid feeling
this connection, and embracing all, without distinction of
- disposition or mental capacity, with heartfelt liking and
affection? That is one meaning that every individual ‚has
in respect of the Whole.

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 3 Day

Do I, on the other hand, observe the eternal wheels of
humanity in motion, this vast interaction, nothing moved by
itself, nothing moving only itself, I am greatly quieted
about the other side of your complaint, that reason and soul,
sensuality and morality, understanding and blind force
appear in such separate masses. Why do you see things
singly that are not single and:do not work by themselves ?
The reason of one and the disposition of another have as
strong a mutual influence as if they were in one and the
same subject. The morality that belongs to this sensuality
is set apart from it, and do you suppose its dominion is, on
that account, limited ? Would the sensuality be better ruled
if the morality, without being specially concentrated any-
where, were divided out in small, scarce noticeable portions
to each individual? The blind power which is allotted to
the great mass, is not, in its operation on the Whole, aban-
doned to a rude peradventure, but the understanding, con-
centrated at other points, leads it, without being aware of
the fact, and it follows, in invisible bands, quite as uncon- —
sciously. The outlines of personality which appear to you
so definite, from my standpoint, dissolve. The magic circle
of prevailing opinions and infectious feelings surrounds all
and plays around all like an atmosphere filled with dis-
solving and magnetic forces. By the most vital diffusion
it smelts all things, even the most distant, into a single
activity, the issue of which is to impel those who are really
in possession of light and truth to activity, so that some
are deeply influenced, and others have at least a superficial
illumination, brilliant and deceptive.

In this connection of everything with the sphere to which
it belongs and in which it has significance all is good and
divine, and a fulness of joy and peace is the feeling of those
who allow all things to work upon them in this great con-
nection. But they will also feel how contemplation isolates
single things in single moments. The common impulse of
men, who know nothing of this dependence, is to seize
and retain this and that, to hedge in their Ego and to

78 SECOND SPEECH.

surfound it with manifold outworks. They seek to conduct
their own existence according to their own self-will and not
be disturbed by the eternal current of the world. And
when we who have an entirely opposite impulse perceive
how fate “necessarily sweeps all this away and how they
wound and torture themselves in a thousand ways, what is
more natural than the most heartfelt compassion with all
the bitter suffering that must arise from this unequal strife,
and with all the stripes which awful Nemesis deals out on
every side ?

From these wanderings through the whole territory of
humanity, pious feeling returns, quickened and educated,
into its own Ego; and there_ finds all the influences that had
streamed upon it from the most distant regions, If, on
returning with the consecration of intercourse with the
world still fresh upon us, we give heed how it is with us in
this feeling, we become conscious that our Ego vanishes,
not only into smallness and insignificance, but into one-
sidedness, insufficiency and nothingness. What lies nearer
to mortal man than unaffected humility ? And when gradu-
ally our feeling becomes quick and alert to what there is in
the path of humanity that sustains and forwards, and what,
on the contrary, must sooner or later be conquered and
destroyed, if it is not recast and transformed, and when
from this law we regard all doings in the world, what is
more natural than deep contrition for all in us that is hostile
to human nature, the submissive desire to conciliate the
Deity, and the most earnest longing to put ourselves and all
that belongs to us in safety in that sacred region where
alone there is security. against death and destruction ?
Advancing further, we perceive how the Whole only
becomes clear to us, how we only reach intuition of it and
unity with it in fellowship with others, by the influence
of those who have long been freed from dependence on
their own fleeting being, and from the endeavour to expand.
and isolate it. How, then, can we avoid a feeling of special

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 79

affinity to those whose actions have defended our existence,
and happily guided it through threatening dangers?
Though by us they become conscious of their life in the
Whole, we honour them as those who, before, us, have
reached this union.

Not by examples which are rare, but by passing through
these and similar feelings you discover in yourselves the
outlines of the fairest and the basest, the noblest and the
most despicable. You not only find at times all the
manifold degrees of human powers within you, but when
self-love is quite submerged in sympathy, all the count-
less mixture of human tendencies that you have ever
seen in the characters of others appears simply arrested
impulses of your own life. There are moments when, de-
spite all distinction of sex, culture, or environment, you
think, feel, and act as if you were really this or that person.
In your own order, you have actually passed through all
those different forms. You are a compendium of humanity.
In a certain sense your single nature embraces all human
nature. Your Ego, bemg multiplied and more clearly out-
lined, is in all its smallest and swiftest changes immortalized
in the manifestations of human nature. As soon as this is
seen, you can love yourselves with a pure and blameless
love. Humility, that never forsakes you, has its counter-
part in the feeling that the whole of humanity lives and
. works in you. Even contrition is sweetened to joyful self-
sufficiency. This is the completion of religion on this side.
I works its way back to the heart, and there finds the
Infinite. The man in whom this is accomplished, is no
more in need of a mediator for any sort of intuition of
humanity. Rather he is himself a mediator for many.

But there is not merely the swinging of feeling between
the’ world and the individual, in the present moment.
Except as something going on, we cannot comprehend
what affects us, and we cannot comprehend ourselves,
except as thus progressively affected. Wherefore, as feeling

80 SECOND SPEECH.

persons, we are ever driven back into the past. The spirit
furnishes the chief nourishment for our piety, and history
immediately and especially is for religion the richest source.

History is not of value for religion, because it hastens or
controls in any way the progress of humanity in its develop-
ment, but because it is the greatest and most general revela-
tion of the deepest and holiest. In this sense, however,

religion begins and ends. with history. Prophecy and
history are for religion the same and indistinguishable, and
all true history has at first had a religious purpose, and has
taken its departure from religious ideas.

What is finest and tenderest in history, moreover,
cannot be communicated scientifically, but can only be
comprehended in the feeling of a religious disposition.
The religious mind recognizes the transmigration of
spirits and souls, which to others is but | graceful fiction,
as, in more than one sense, a wonderful arrangement
of the Universe for comparing the different periods of
humanity according to a sure standard. After a long
period, during which nature could produce nothing similar,
some distinguished individual almost entirely the same
returns. But only the seers recognize him, and it is they
who should judge by his works the signs of different times.
A movement of humanity returns exactly like something
of which some distant foretime has left you an image, and
you are to recognize from the various causes which have
now .produced it, the course of development and the
formula of its law. The genius of some human endow- |
ment awakes as from slumber. Here and there rising and
falling, it has already finished its course. Now it appears
in a new life in another place and under different circum-
stances. Its quicker increase, its deeper working, its fairer —
stronger form, indicate how much the climate of humanity
has improved, and how much fitter the soil has grown to
nourish nobler plants. Peoples and generations of mortals
appear as all alike necessary for the completeness of history,

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 8I

though, like individuals, of different worth. Some are
estimable and spirited, and work strongly without ceasing,
permeating space and defying time. Others are common
and insignificant, fitted only to show some peculiar shade
of some single form of life. For one moment only they -
are really living and noticeable. One thought they
exhibit, one conception they produce, and then they hasten
towards destruction that the power that produced them may
be given to something else. As vegetable nature, from
the destruction of whole species, and from the ruins of
whole generations of plants, produces and nourishes a new
race, so spiritual nature rears from the ruins of a glorious
and beautiful world of men, a new world that draws its
first vital strength from elements decomposed and won-
drously transformed. Being deeply impressed with this
sense of a universal connection, your glance perhaps passes
so often directly from least to greatest and greatest to
least, going backwards and forwards, till through dizziness
it can neither distinguish great nor small, cause nor
effect, preservation nor destruction, This state continues,
and then that well-known figure of an eternal fate appears.
Its features bear the impress of this state, being a
marvellous mixture of obstinate self-will and deep wisdom,
of rude unfeeling force and heartfelt love, of which first one
seizes you and then another, now inviting you to impotent
defiance and now to childlike submission.

Penetrate further and compare this partial striving of the
individual, the fruit of opposing views, with the quiet uniform
course of the Whole. You will see how the high World-
Spirit smilingly marches past all that furiously opposes him.
You will see how dread Nemesis, never wearied, follows his
steps, meting out punishment to the haughty who resist
the gods. Even the stoutest and choicest who have with
steadfastness, worthy perhaps of praise and wonder, refused
to bow before the gentle breath of the great Spirit, it mows

down with iron hand. Would you comprehend the proper
G ‘

82 ' SECOND SPEECH.

character of all changes and of all human progress, a
feeling resting on history must show you more surely than
aught else, that living gods rule who hate nothing so much
as death, and that nothing is to be persecuted and
destroyed like this first and last foe of the spirit. The
rude, the barbarian, the formless are to be absorbed and
recast. Nothing is to be a dead mass that moves only by
impact and resists only by unconscious collision ; all is
to be individual, connected, complex, exalted life. Blind
instinct, unthinking custom, dull obedience, everything
lazy and passive, all those sad symptoms of the death
slumber of freedom and humanity are to be abolished. To
this the work of the minutes and the centuries is directed,
it is the great ever advancing work of redemptive love.
Some prominent emotions of religion connected with na-
ture and humanity, I have now sketched in vague outline.
I have brought you to the limits of your horizon. Here is
the end and summit of religion for all to whom humanity
is the whole world. But consider that in your feeling
there is something that despises these bounds, something
in virtue of which you cannot stay where you are. Beyond
this point only infinity is to be looked into. I will not
speak of the presentiments which define themselves and
become thoughts which might by subtilty be established,
that humanity, being capable of motion and cultivation,
being not only differently manifested in the individual,
but here and there really being different, cannot possibly
be the highest, the sole manifestation of the unity of spirit
and matter. As the individual is only one form of

humanity, so humanity may be only one form of this
unity. Beside it many other similar forms may exist,
bounding it and standing over against it. But in our own
feeling we all find something similar. The dependence
of our earth, and therefore of the highest unity it has pro-
duced, upon other worlds, has been impressed upon us

both by nature-and by education. Hence-this ever active

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 83

but seldom understood presentiment of some other
marriage of spiritand matter, visible and finite, ‚ but above
humanity, higher and closer and productive of more
beautiful forms. But any sketch that could be drawn
would be too definite. Any echo of the feeling could only
be fleeting and vague. Hence it is exposed to misconcep-
tion and is so often taken for folly and-superstition.

This is sufficient reference to a thing so immeasurably
far from you. More would be incomprehensible. Had you
only the religion that you could have! Were you but
conscious of what you already have! Were you to con-
sider the few religious opinions and feelings that I have so
slightly sketched, you would be very far from finding them
all strange to you. Something of the same kind you must
have had in your thoughts before. But I do not know
whether to lack religion quite, or not to understand it, is
the greater misfortune. In the latter case also it fails of its
purpose, and you impose upon yourselves in addition.

Two things I would specially blame in you. Some things
you select and stamp as exclusively religious, other things *
you withdraw from religion as exclusively moral. Both you
apparently do on the same ground. Religion with you is
the retribution which alights on all who resist the Spirit
of the Whole, it is the hatred everywhere active against
haughtiness and audacity, the steady advance of all human
things to one goal. You are conscious of the feeling that
points to this unfailing progress. After it has been purified
from all abuses, you would willingly see it sustained and ex-
tended. But you will then have it that this is exclusively
religion, and you would exclude other feelings that take
their rise from the same operation of the mind in exactly

the same way.

How have you come to this torn off fragment? I will tell
you. Youdo not regard it as religion but as an echo of
moral action, and you simply wish to foist the name upon
it, in order to give religion the last blow. What we have

@ 2

84 SECOND SPEECH.

agreed to acknowledge as religion does not arise exclu-
sively in the moral sphere, not at least in the narrow
sense in which you understand the word. Feeling knows
nothing of such a limited predilection. If I direct you
specially to the sphere of the spirit and to history, it does
not follow that the moral world is religion’s Universe. In
your narrow sense of it the moral world would produce
very few religious emotions. The pious man can detect
the operation of the World-Spirit in all that belongs to
human activity, in play and earnest, in smallest things and
in greatest. Everywhere he perceives enough to move
him by the presence of this Spirit and without this in-
fluence nothing is his own. Therein he finds a divine
Nemesis that those who, being predominantly ethical or
rather legal, would, by selecting from religion only the
elements suited to this purpose, make of it an insignificant
appendage to morals, do yet, purify religion as they may,
. irrecoverably corrupt their moral doctrine itself and sow
in it the seed of new errors. When anyone succumbs in
moral action, it sounds well to say it is the will of the
Eternal, and that what does not succeed through us, will
sometime, by others, come to pass, But if this high assur-
ance belonged to moral action, moral action would be depen-
dent on the degree of receptivity for this assurance in each
person at any moment. Morality cannot include immedi-
ately aught of feeling without at once. having its original
power and purity disturbed.

With all those feelings, love, humility, joy, and. the
others that I pictured as the undulation of the mind
between the two points of which the world is one, and your
Ego the other, you deal in another way. ‘The ancients knew
what was right. They called them all piety. For them
those feelings were an essential part of religion, the noblest
part. You also recognize them, but you try to persuade
yourselves that they are an essential section of your moral
action. You would justify these sentiments on moral

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 85

principles, and assign them their place in your moral
system. But in vain, for, if you remain true to your-
_ selves, they will there neither be desired nor endured. If
action proceed directly from the emotions of love or affec-
tion, it will be insecure and thoughtless. Moral action
should not proceed : from such a momentary 1 influence of an
outward object. Wherefore your doctrine of morals, when
itis strict and pure, acknowledges no reverence except for
its own law. Everything done from pity or gratitude it
‘condemns as impure, almost as selfish. It makes light of,
almost despises, humility. If you talk of contrition it speaks
of lost time being needlessly increased. Your own feeling
must assure you that the immediate object of all these sen-
timents is not action. They are spontaneous functions of
your deepest and highest life, coming by themselves and
ending by themselves() Why do you make such an ado,

and begging for grace for them, where they have no right
tobe? Be content to consider them religion, and then you .

will not need to demand anything for them except their
own sure rights, and you will not deceive yourselves with
the baseless claims which you are disposed to make in
their name. Return them to religion : the treasure belongs
to it alone. As the possessor of it, religion is for morality
and all else that is an object of human doing, not the hand-
maid, but an. indispensable friend and sufficient advocate
with humanity. This is the rank of religion, as the sum
of all higher feelings.

That it alone removes man from one-sidedness and narrow-
_ ness I have already indicated. Now Iam ina position to
ben more definite. In all activity and working, be it moral
or artistic, man must strive for mastery. But when man
becomes quite absorbed, all mastery limits and chills, and
makes one-sided and hard. The mind is directed chiefly to
one point, and this one point cannot satisfy it. Can man,
by advancing from one narrow work to another, really use
his whole power? Will not the larger part be unused, and

86 SECOND SPEECH.

turn, in consequence, against himself and devour him?
How many of you go to ruin because you are too great for
yourselves? A superfluity of power and impulse that
never issues in any work, because there is no work adequate,
drives you aimlessly about, and is your destruction.

To resist this evil would you have those who are too great
for one object of human endeavour, unite them all—art,
science, life, and any others youmay know of? This would
simply be your old desire to have humanity complete every-
where, your ever recurring love of uniformity. But is it
possible? Those objects, as soon as they are attended to
separately, all alike strive to rouse and dominate the mind.
Each tendency is directed to a work that should be com-
pleted, it has an ideal to be copied, a totality to be em-
braced. This rivalry of several objects of endeavour can
only end by one expelling the others. Nay, even within
this one sphere, the more eminent a mastery a man would
attain, the more he must restrict himself. But if this pre-
eminence entirely occupy him, and if he lives only to attain
it, how shall he duly participate in the world, and how shall
his life become a whole? Hence most virtuosos are one- :
sided and defective, or at least, outside of their own sphere,
they sink into an inferior kind of life.

The only remedy is for each man, while he is definitely
active in some one department, to allow himself, ‚without
definite activity, to be affected by the ‘Infinite. In In every
species of religious feeling he will then become conscious of
all that lies beyond the department which he directly culti-
vates. The Infinite is near to everyone, for whatever be the
object you have chosen for your deliberate technical working,
it does not demand much thought to advance from it to find
the Universe. In it you discover the rest as precept, or in-
spiration or revelation. The only way of acquiring what
lies outside the direction of the mind we have selected, is
to enjoy and comprehend it thus as a whole, not by will as
art, but by instinct for the Universe as religion.

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. © oe

Even in the religious form these objects again fall into
rivalry. This result of human imperfection causes religion
to appear dismembered. Religion takes the form of some
peculiar receptivity and taste for art, philosophy or morality,
and is consequently often mistaken. Oftener, I say, it
appears thus than freed from all participation in one-sided-
ness, than completed, all-embracing. Yet this complete
form of religion remains the highest, and it is only by it,
that, with satisfactory result, man sets alongside of the finite
that he specially concentrates on, an Infinite; alongside of
_ the contracting endeavour for something definite and com-
plete, expansive soaring in the Whole and the Inexhaustible.
In this way .he restores the balance and harmony of his
nature, which would be lost for ever, if, without at the
same time having religion, he abandon himself to one object,
were it the most beautiful, most splendid. A man’s special
_ calling is the melody of his life, and it remains a simple,
meagre series of notes unless religion, with its endlessly
rich variety, accompany it with all notes, and raise the
simple song to a full-voiced, glorious harmony.

If then this, that I trust I have indicated clearly enough
for you all, is really the nature of religion, I have already an-
swered the questions, Whence do those dogmas and doctrines
come that many consider the essence of religion ? “Where do
they properly belong? And how do they stand related to
what is essential in religion? They are all the result of that
contemplation of feeling, of that reflection and comparison,
of which we have already spoken. The conceptions that
underlie these propositions are, like your conceptions from

even for communicating religion, but reflection requires
and creates them. Miracle, inspiration, revelation, super-
natural intimations, much piety can be had without the need
of any one of these conceptions. But when feeling is made
the subject of reflection and comparison they are absolutely

88 SECOND SPEECH.

unavoidable. In this sense all these conceptions do cer-
tainly belong to the sphere of religion, and indeed belong
without condition or the smallest limit to their application.
“The strife about what event is properly a miracle, and
wherein its character properly consists, how much Seien
there may be and how far and for what reasons man may pro-
perly believe in it, and the manifest endeavour to deny and
set aside as much as can be done with decency and .con-
sideration, in the foolish notion that philosophy and reason
are served thereby, is one of the childish operations of the
metaphysicians and moralists in religion. They confuse
trespassed on the universal validity of scientificand ‘ida’
conclusions. Pray do not be misled, to the detriment of
religion, by their sophistical disputations, nor even by
their hypocritical mystery about what they would only too
willingly publish. Religion, however loudly it may demand —
back all those well abused conceptions, leaves your physics
untouched, and please God, also your psychology.
Whatisa miracle? What we call miracle is everywhere
else called sign, indication. Our name, which means a
wonder, refers purely to the mental condition of the ob-
server. Itis only in so far appropriate that a sign, espe-
cially when it is nothing besides, must be fitted to call
attention to itself and to the power in it that gives it signifi-
cance. Every finite thing, however, is a sign of the Infinite,
and so these various expressions declare the immediate rela-
tion of a phenomenon to the Infinite and the Whole. But
does that involve that every event should not have quite as
immediate a relation to the finite and to nature? Miracle
is simply the religious name for event. Every event, even
the most natural and usual, becomes a miracle, as soon as
the religious view of it can be the dominant. . To me all is
miracle. In your sense the inexplicable and strange alone is
miracle, i in mine it is no miracle. The more religious you
are, the more miracle would you see everywhere. All dis-

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. | 89

puting about single events, as to whether or not they are to
be called miraculous, gives me a painful impression of the
poverty and wretchedness of the religious sense of the
combatants. One party show it by protesting everywhere
against miracle, whereby they manifest their wish not to
see anything of immediate relationship to the Infinite and
to the Deity. The other party display the same poverty
by laying stress on this and that. A phenomenon for them
must be marvellous before they will regard it as a miracle,
whereby they simply announce that they are bad observers."°

What is revelation ? Every original and new communica-
tion of the Universe to man is a revelation, as, for example,
every. such moment of conscious insight as I have just
referred to. Every intuition and every original feeling
proceeds from revelation. As revelation lies beyond con- —
sciousness, demonstration is not possible, yet we are not
merely to assume it generally, but each one knows best
himself what is repeated and learned elsewhere, and what
is original and new. If nothing original has yet been
generated in you, when it does come it will be a revelation
for you also, and I counsel you to weigh it well.

What is inspiration? Itis simply the general expression
for the feeling of true morality and freedom. But do not
mistake me. It is not that marvellous and much-praised
morality and freedom that accompany and embellish actions
with deliberations. It is that action which springs from
the heart of man, despite of, or at least, regardless of,
all external occasion. In the same measure in which this
action is freed from all earthly entanglement, it is ae as
divine and referred to God.

What is prophecy? Every religious anticipation of the
other half of a religious event, one half being given, is
prophecy. It was very religious of the ancient Hebrews to
measure the divineness of a prophet, neither by the difficulty
of predicting, nor by the greatness of the subject, but,
quite simply, by the issue, for we cannot know from one

90 SECOND SPEECH.

thing how complete the feeling is in everything, till we see
whether the religious aspect of this one special circumstance
has been rightly comprehended..

What is operation of grace 217 Nothing else manifestly

than the common expression for revelation and inspira-
tion, for interchange between the entrance of the world
into man, through intuition and feeling, and the out-
going of man into the world, through action and culture.
Itincludes both, in their originality and in their divine
character, so that the whole life of the pious simply forms a
series of operations of divine grace.
You see-that all these ideas, in so far as religion requires,
or can adopt ideas, are the first and the most essential.
They indicate in the most characteristic manner a man’s
consciousness of his religion, because they indicate just
what necessarily and universally must be in it. The man
who does not see miracles of his own from the standpoint
from which he contemplates the world, the man in whose
heart no revelation of his own arises, when his soul longs —
to draw in the beauty of the world, and to be permeated by
its spirit; the man who does not, in supreme moments, feel,
with the most lively assurance, that a divine spirit urges
him, and that he speaks and acts from holy inspiration, has
no religion. The religious man must, at least, be con-
scious of his feelings as the immediate product. of the
Universe; for less would mean nothing. He must recog-
nize something individual in them, something that cannot
be imitated, something that guarantees the purity of their
origin from his own heart. To be assured of this pasaaszton
is the true belief.

Belief, on the contrary, usually so called, which is to
accept what another has said or done, or to wish to think
and feel as another has thought and felt, is a hard and base
service. So far is it from being the highest in religion, as .
is asserted, that it must be rejected by all who would force
their way into the sanctuary of religion. To wish to have and

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 91

hold a faith that is an echo, proves that a man is incapable
of religion ; to demand it of others, shows that there is no
understanding of religion. You wish always to stand on
your own feet and go your own way, and this worthy intent
should not scare you from religion. Religion is no slavery,
no captivity, least of all for your reason. You must belong
to yourselves. Indeed, this is an indispensable condition
of having any part in religion.

Every man, a few choice souls excepted, hones to be sure,
require a guide to lead and stimulate, to wake his religious
sense from its first slumber, and to give it its first direction.
But this you accord to all powers and functions of the human
soul, and why not to this one? For your satisfaction, be it

said, that here, if anywhere, this tutelage is only a passing —

state. Hereafter, shall each man see with his own eyes,
and shall produce some contribution to the treasures of
religion ; otherwise, he deserves no place in its kingdom,
and receives none. Youare right in despising the wretched
echoes who derive their religion entirely from another, or
depend on a dead writing, swearing by it and proving out
of it.

Every sacred writing is in itself a glorious production,

a speaking monument from the heroic time of religion, but,

through servile reverence, it would become merely a mau-
soleum, a monument that a great spirit once was there, but
is now no more. Did this spirit still live and work, he
would look with love, and with a feeling of equality upon
his work which yet could only be a weaker impress of him-
self. Not every person has religion who believes in a sacred
writing, but only the man who has a lively and immediate
understanding of it, and who, therefore, so far as he him-
self is concerned, could most easily do without it.

Your very contempt for the poverty stricken and power-
less venerators of religion, in whom, from lack of nourish-
ment, religion died before ever it came to the birth, con-
vinces me that you have a talent for religion. The same

|
. «"

92 | SECOND SPEECH.

thing appears from your regard for the persons of all true
heroes of religion. That you should treat them” with
shallow scoffing or not acknowledge what is great or
powerful in them, I would hardly ascribe to you. This
regard for the persons confirms me in the thought that
your contempt for the thing rests merely on a misunder-
standing, and has for its object only the miserable figure
which religion takes in the great incapable mass, and the
abuses which presumptuous leaders carry on.

I have tried, as best I could, therefore, to show you
what religion really is. Have you found anything therein
unworthy of you, nay, of the highest human culture?
Must you not rather long all the more for that universal
union with the world which is only possible through feeling,
the more you are separated and isolated by definite culture
and individuality? Have you not often felt this holy
longing, as something unknown? Become conscious of the
call of your deepest nature and follow it, I conjure you..
Banish the false shame of a century which should not
determine you but should be made and determined by you.
Return to what lies so near to you, yes, even to you, the
violent separation from which cannot fail to destroy the
most beautiful part of your nature.

It appears to me, however, that many among you do not
believe that I can here mean to end my present business.
How can I have spoken thoroughly of the nature of
religion, seeing I have not treated.at all of immortality, and
of God only a little in passing ? Is it not incumbent upon
me, most of all, to speak of these two things and to repre-

„sent to you how unhappy you would be without belief in
them? For are not these two things, for most pious
people, the very poles and first articles of religion ?

But I am not of your opinion. First of all, I do not
believe I have said nothing about immortality. and so little
about God. Both, I believe, are in all and in everything
that, I have addnced as an element of religion. Had I not

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. | 93

presupposed God and immortality I could not have said
what I have said, for, only what is divine and immortal has
room in which to speak of religion.

In the second place, just as little do I consider that I

have the right to hold the conceptions and doctrines of
God and of immortality, as they are usually understood, to.
be the principal things in religion. Only what in either
is feeling and immediate consciousness, can belong to
religion. God and immortality, however, as they are
found in such doctrines, are ideas. How many among
you—possibly most of you—are firmly convinced of one
or other or both of those doctrines, without being on that
account pious or having religion. As ideas they can have
no greater value in religion han ideas generally.
But that you may not think I am afraid to speak a
straightforward word on this subject, because it would be
dangerous to speak, till some definition of God and existence
that has stood its trial, has been brought to light and has
been accepted in the German Empire as good and valid ;
or lest you should, on the other hand, perhaps, believe that
I am playing on you a pious fraud and wish, in order to be
all things to all men, with seeming indifference to make
light of what must be of far greater importance to me than
I will confess—lest you should think these things, I shall
gladly be questioned and will endeavour to make ciear to
you that, according to my best conviction, it really is, as I
have just now maintained.

Remember in the first place that any feeling is not an
emotion of piety because in it a single object as such
affects us, but only i in so far as in it and along with it, it
‘affects us as revelation of God. It is, therefore, not an
individual or finite thing, but God, in whom alone the
particular thing is one and all, that enters our life. Nor
do we stand over against the World and in it at the
same time by any one faculty, but by our whole being.
The divine in us, therefore, is immediately affected and

94 SECOND SPEECH.

called forth by the feeling) Seeing then that I have pre-
sented nothing but just this immediate and original
existence of God in us through feeling, how can anyone say
that I have depicted a religion without God? Is s not God
the highest, the only unity? Is it not God alone before
whom and in whom all particular things disappear? And
if you see the world as a Whole, a Universe, can you do it
otherwise than in God? If not, how could you dis-
tinguish the highest existence, the original and eternal
Being from a temporal and derived individual? Other-
wise than by the emotions produced in us by the world
we do not claim to have God in our feeling, and_conse-
quently I have not said more of Him.

If you will not admit that this is to have God, and to
be conscious of Him, I can neither teach nor direct you
farther. How much you may know I do not judge, for it
does not at present concern me, but in respect of feeling and
sentiment, you would be for me godless. Science, it is true,
is extolled as giving an immediate knowledge about God,
that isthe source of all other knowledge; only we are not
now speaking of science, but of religion, This way of
knowing about God which most praise and which I also
am to laud, is neither the idea of God as the undivided
unity and source of all, that is placed by you at the head of
all knowledge ; nor is it the feeling of God in the heart, of
which we boast ourselves. It lags far behind the demands
of science, and is for piety something quite subordinate.
It is an idea compounded from characteristics, from what
are called attributes of God. These attributes correspond
to the different ways | in which the unity of the individual
and the Whole, expresses itself in feeling. Hence I can
only say of this idea, what I have said of ideas generally,
in reference to religion, that there can be much piety with-
out it, and that it is first formed when piety is made an
object of contemplation,

Yet this idea of God, as it is usually conceived, is dif-

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 95

ferent from the other ideas before: adduced, for though it
seeks to be the highest and to stand above all, God, being
thought of as too like us, as a thinking and willing Person,
is drawn down into the region of opposition. It therefore
appears natural that the more like man God is conceived,
the more easily another mode of presentation is set over
‚against it. Hence, we have an idea of the Highest Being,
not as personally thinking and willing, but exalted above
all personality, as the universal, productive, ers
necessity of all thought and existence.

Nothing seems to me less fitting than for the adherents
of the former view to charge with godlessness those who,
in dread of this anthropomorphism, take refuge in the other,
or for the adherents of this latter view to make the human-
ness of the idea of God a ground for charging the adherents
of the former with idolatry, or for declaring their piety void.

It matters not what conceptions a man adheres to, he can
still be pious. His piety, the divine in his feeling, may 7 be
better than his. conception, : and his desire to place the
essence of piety in conception, only makes him misunder-
stand himself. Consider how narrow is the presentation of
God in the one conception, and how dead and rigid in the
other. Neither corresponds to its object, and thus cannot be
aproof of piety, except in so far as it rests on somethingin the
mind, of , of which it has come far short. Rightly understood,
both, present, at least, one element of feeling, but, without
feeling, neither is ‘of any value. Many believe in and
accept a God p sented in conception, and yet are nothing
less than nioud and | in no case is this conception the germ
from which their piety could ever spring, for it has no life
in itself, Neither conception is any sign of a perfect or of
an imperfect religion, but perfection and imperfection.

sense. clint cfucihins more that could ld bring us to
an understanding on this subject of conceptions, let us now
go on to consider the development of the religious sense.

96 SECOND SPEECH.

As long as man’s whole relation to the world has not
arrived at clearness, this feeling is but a vague instinct,
the world can appear to him nothing but a confused unity.
Nothing of its complexity is definitely distinguishable. It.
is to him a chaos, uniform in its confusion, without division,
order, or law. Apart from what most immediately concerns
the subsistence of man, he distinguishes nothing as indi-
vidual except by arbitrarily cutting it off in time and space.
Here you will find but few traces of any conceptions, and
you will scarcely discern to which side they incline. You
will not set much value on the difference, whether a blind
fate, only to be indicated by magic rites, exhibits the
character of the Whole, or a being, alive indeed, but with-
out definite characteristics, an idol, a fetich, one, or, if
many, only distinguishable by the arbitrarily appointed .
limits of their sphere.

As we advance, the feeling becomes more conscious.
Circumstances display themselves in their complexity and
definiteness. The multiplicity. of the heterogeneous ele-
ments and powers, by whose constant and determined
strife, phenome are determined, becomes more prominent
in man’s consciousness of the world. In the same degree
the result of the contemplation of this feeling changes.
The opposite forms of the idea stand more distinctly apart.
Blind fate ate changes into a higher necessity, in which, though
unattainable and unsearchable, reason s an md conneeiten rest.

at the same time divides and multiplies, each. power and
element becomes animate, and gods arise in endless number.
They are now distinguishable by means of the different
objects of their activity, and different inclinations and dis-
positions. A stronger, fairer life of the Universe in feeling
you must acknowledge is here exhibited. It is most
beautiful when this new won complexity and this innate
. highest unity are most intimately bound together in feeling,
as for example, among the Greeks, whom you so justly

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 97

revere. Both forms then unite i ion, one being of
more value for thought, the other for art, one showing more

ele PS ee

of 1 the complexity, the other of the unity. But this stage,
even without such a union is more perfect than the former,
especially ‘if the idea of the Highest Being is placed rather
in the eternal unattainable necessity, than in single
gods.

Let us now mount higher where opposing elements are
again united, where existence, by exhibiting itself as totality,
as unity in variety, as system, f first. dese serves-its. name. Is
not the man who perceives existence both as one and as all,
who stands over against the Whole, and yet is one with it
in feeling, to be accounted happier in his religion, let his

feeling mirror itself in idea as it may? There as elsewhere
then, the manner in which the Deity is present to man in feel-
ing, is decisive of the worth of his religion, not the manner,
always inadequate, in which it is copied in idea. Suppose
there is someone arrived at this stage, who rejects the
idea of a personal God. I will not decide on the justice of
the names you are accustomed to apply to him, whether
Pantheist or Spinozist. This rejection of the idea of a
personal Deity does not decide against the presence of
the Deity in his feeling. The ground of such a rejection
might be a humble consciousness of the limitation of per-
sonal existence, and particularly of personality joined to
consciousness. He might stand as high above a worship-
per of the twelve gods whom you would rightly name after
Lucretius, as a pious person at that stage would be above
an idolater. |

But we have here the old confusion, the unmistakable
sign of defective culture. Those who are at the same
stage, only not at the same point, are most strongly
repudiated. T’he proper standard of religiousness, that

ee oe

which announces the stage to which a man has attained, is

et a eet

his sense for the Deity. But_to which idea he will attach

himself depends purely on n what he requires it for, and
H

.

98 SECOND SPEECH.

whether his imagination chiefly inclines towards existence
and nature or consciousness and thought.

“You will not, I trust, consider it blasphemy or incon-
gruity that such a matter should depend on the direction of
the imagination. By imagination I do not mean anything
subordinate or confused, but the highest and most original
faculty in man. All else in the human ı mind is simply
reflection upon it, and is therefore dependent on it.
Imagination in this sense is the free generation of thoughts,
whereby you come to a conception of the world; such a
conception you cannot receive from without, nor compound
from inferences. From this conception you are then im-
pressed with the feeling of omnipotence. The subsequent
translation into thought depends on whether one is willing
in the consciousness of his own weakness to be lost in the
mysterious obscurity, or whether, first of all, seeking
definiteness of thought, he cannot think of anything
except under the one form given to us, that of conscious-
ness or self-consciousness. Recoil from the obscurity 0: of
indefinite thought is_the one tendency of the im agination,
recoil recoil from the appearance of contradiction in transferring
the forms of the finite to the Infinite is the other.

Now cannot the same inwardness of religion be combined
with both? Would not a closer consideration show that
the two ways of conceiving are not very wide apart? But
the pantheistic idea is not to be thought of as death, and
no effort is to be spared to surpass in thought the limits of
the personal idea.

So much I have thought it necessary to say, not so much
in explanation of my own position, as to prevent you from
thinking that all are despisers of ‚religion who will n not
accept the personality of the Highest Being as it it is ; is usually
set set forth. And I am quite convinced that what has been
said will not make the idea of the personality of God more
uncertain for anyone who truly has it; nor will anyone
more easily rid himself of the almost absolute necessity to

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. 99

acquire it, for knowing whence this necessity comes. Among
traly religious men there have never been zealots, enthu-
siasts, or fanatics for this idea. Even when timidity and
hesitation about itis called atheism, truly pious persons
will leave it alone with great tranquillity. Not to have the
Deity immediately present in one’s feeling has always
seemed to them more irreligious. They would most un-
willingly believe that anyone could in point of fact be quite
without religion. They believe that only those who are
quite without feeling, and whose nature has become brutish,
can have no consciousness of the God that is in us and in the
world, and of the divine life and operation whereby all things
consist. But whosoever insists, it matters not how many
excellent men _ hat the highest piety consists
in confessing that the Highest Being thinks asa person and
wills outside the world, cannot be far travelled in the region
of piety. Nay, the profoundest words of the most zealous
defenders of his own faith must still be strange to him.

The number who would have something from this God,
that is alien to piety, is only too great. He is to give an
outward guarantee of their blessedness and incite them to
morality. They want to have it.before their eyes. They
would not have God working on man by freedom, but in
the only way in which one free being can work on another,
by necessity, by making himself known either by pain or
by pleasure. But this cannotincite usto morality. Every
external incitement is alien to morality, whether it be
hope or fear, To follow it where it concerns morality is
unfree, therefore unmoral. But the Highest Being, par-
ticularly when he is thought of as free, cannot w vun to
make freedom itself not free, and morality not moral.

This now brings me to the second point, to immortality.
I cannot conceal that in the usual manner of treating this
subject there is still more e that seems to me inconsistent
with the nature of piety. I believe I have just shown you
in what way each one bears in himself an unchangeable and

H 2 f

(W
En
Viana

te

|

100 SECOND SPEECH.

eternal nature. If our feeling nowhere attaches itself to
the individual, but if its content is our relation to God
wherein all that is individual and fleeting disappears, there
can be nothing fleeting in it, but all must be eternal. In
the religious life then we may well say we have already
offered up and disposed of all that is mortal, and that we
actually are enjoying immortality. But the immortality that
most men imagine and their longing for it, seem to me
irreligious, nay quite opposed to the spirit of piety. Dis-
like to the very aim of religion is the ground of their wish to
‘be immortal. Recall how religion earnestly strives to expand
the sharply cut outlines of personality. Gradually they are
“to be lost in the Infinite that we, becoming conscious of the
Universe, may as much as possible be one withit. But men
struggle against this aim. They are anxious about their
personality, and do not wish to overstep the accustomed
limit or to be anything else but a manifestation of it. The
one opportunity that death gives them of transcending it,
they are very far from wishing toembrace. On the contrary,
they are concerned as to how they are to carry it with them
beyond this life, and their utmost endeavour is for longer
sight and betterlimbs. But God speaks to them as it stands
written, “ Whosoever loses his life for my sake, the same
shall keep it, and whosoever keeps it, the same shall lose
it.” The life that they would keep is one that cannot be
kept. If their concern is with the eternity of their single
person, why are they not as anxious about what it has been
as about what it is to be? What does forwards avail when
they cannot go backwards? They desire an immortality
that is no immortality. They are not even capable of com-
prehending it, for who can endure the effort to conceive an
endless temporal existence? Thereby they lose the immor-
tality they could always have, and their mortal life in
addition, by thoughts that distress and torture them in vain.
Would they but attempt to surrender their lives from love
to God! Would they but strive to annihilate their person-

THE NATURE OF RELIGION. IOI

ality and to live in the One ai in the All! Whosoever has
learned to be more than himself, knows that he loses little
when he loses himself. Only the ma man who denying himself
sinks himself 1 in as 1 as much of the whole | Univer se as he can

a ane

arisen, has a right to ‘the hopes that . death gives. With him
aloneitisreally possible to hold further converse about the
endlessness to which, through death, we infallibly soa

This then is my view of these subjects. The usual con-
ception of God as one single being outside of the world
and behind the world is not the beginning and the end of
religion. It is only one manner of expressing God, seldom
entirely pure and always inadequate. Such an idea may be
formed from mixed motives, from the need for such a being
to console and help, and such a God may be believed in
without piety, at least in my sense, and I think in the true
and right sense. If, however, this idea is formed, not
arbitrarily, but somehow by the necessity of a man’s way
of thinking, if he needs it for the security of his piety, the
imperfections of his idea will not cumber him nor contami-
nate his piety. Yetthe true nature of religion is neither this

aOR fe
PR acti r

idea nor any other, but immediate consciousness of the Deity
as He is found in ourselves and in the world. Similarly
the goal and the character of the religious Tife is not the
immortality desired and believed in by many—or what their
craving to be too wise about it would: suggest—pretended
to be believed in by many. It is not the immortality that
is outside of time, behind it, or rather after it, and which still
is in time. It is the immortality which we can now have
in this temporal life ; it is the problem in the solution of
which we are for ever to be engaged. In the midst of
finitude to be one with the Infinite and in every moment
to be eternal is the immortality of religion.

102 SECOND SPEECH.

EXPLANATIONS OF THE SECOND SPEECH.

(1) Page 32.—The rhetorical character of this book and the im-
possibility of continuing the subject, had my opinion really been
that religion is this restored unity of knowledge, wouid have allowed
me to say so by a very slight suggestion of irony. My meaning
would then have been that I would not now press this truth upon
my opponents, but that elsewhere and in. another form I would
carry it to a victorious issue. Wherefore it seems necessary to guard
myself against this interpretation, especially as so many theologians
seem to maintain at present that religion, and not religion generally,
but the Christian religion, is the highest knowledge. Not only in
dignity but in form is it identified with metaphysical speculations.
It is the most successful and pre-eminent, and all speculations that
do not reach the same results, as for example, if they cannot deduce
the Trinity, have failed. The assertion of others that the more im-
perfect, especially the Polytheistic religions have no kinship with
Christianity is similar. I reject both, and in respect of the latter I
have sought, in the further progress of this book, and in the Intro-
duction to my “ Glaubenslehre,” to show how all forms of religion,
even the most imperfect, are the same in kind. In respect of the
former position, if a philosopher as such will attempt to prove a
Trinity in the Highest Being, he does it at his risk, and I would
maintain that this is not a Christian Trinity because, being a
speculative idea, it has its origin in another part of the soul.

Were religion really the highest: knowledge, the scientific method
alone would be suitable for its extension, and religion could be
acquired by study, athing not hitherto asserted. Philosophy would
be the first round in the ladder, the religion of the Christian laity
would as ziorıs be an imperfect way of having the highest know-
ledge, and theology as yvaoıs would be the perfect way and stand
at the top, and no one of the three stages would be consistent with
the other two. This I cannot at all accept; therefore I cannot hold
religion the highest knowledge, or r indeed knowledge at all. Where-

fore, what the Christian layman has in less perfection than the

EXPLANATIONS. 103

theologian and which manifestly isa knowledge is not religion itself,
but something appended to it.

At (2) Page 39,—In rhetorical exposition generally, strict definitions
are dispensed with, and descriptions are substituted. This whole
speech is simply an extended description, mixed with criticism of
other conceptions, which in my opinion are false. The chief points
being scattered are of necessity repeated in different places, under
different expressions. This change of expression presents different
sides of the matter, and I find it useful evenin more scientific treatment
for avoiding the scrupulosity of too rigid a terminology. In this kind
of writing it seemed specially appropriate. Wherefore three different
expressions follow in rapid succession. It is said here of religion
that through it, the universal ewistence of all finite things in the
Infinite lives immediately in us. On page 39 it stands religion is
sense and taste for the Infinite. Sense may be capacity of perception
or capacity of sensibility. There it is the latter. In the former
editions, sensibility and taste stood not quite correctly for sense and
taste for the Infinite. What I am conscious of or feel, must be
imagined, and that is what I call the life of the object in me. But

—mnee

the Infinite, meaning not something unconditioned, but the infinity

I ea Saar

of existence generally, We Ca we Cannot be conscious of immediately and
through itself. It can only be through a finite object, by means of
which our tendency to postulate and seek a a world, leads us from detail
and part to the All and the Whole. Hence sense for the Infinite
and the immediate life of the ‘finite in us as it is in the Infinite, are
one and the same. If then, in the first expression, taste be now
added to sense, and in the latter expression, the universal existence
of all finite things in the Infinite be made explicit, both become
essentially identical. Taste includes liking as well as mere faculty,
and it is by this liking, this desire to find not merely the finite thing,
but to be conscious through it of the Infinite, that the pious person
finds that the existence of the finite in the Infinite is universal.
There is a similar passage on page 36. The connection shows that
the expression contemplation is to be taken in the widest sense, not

as speculation proper, but as all movement of the spirit withdrawn

from outward activity. ~ What, however, has struck most
peat 18 tha t the Infinite Existence” does not “app ear to be ‘the

woe!

Anime that TFT can be placed i in such a relation as cause, ‘awl ichr I leave
you to say whether the World can be conceived as a true Alland
Whole without God, ‘Therefore I remained satished with that | ex-
pression, that I I might not decide on the various | Ways © “OF Conceiving

104 SECOND SPEECH.

God and the World as together or as outside of one another, which
did not fall to be considered here, and could only have limited the
horizon in a hurtful manner.

(3) Page 41.—This passage on the departed Novalis was first

inserted in the second edition. Many I believe will wonder at this

juxtaposition, not seeing that he is like Spinoza, or that he holds the
same conspicuous position in art as Spinoza in science. Without
destroying the balance of the Speech, I could only suggest my reason.
There is now another reason why I should say no more. During these
fifteen years the attention to Spinoza, awakened by Jacobi’s writings
and continued by many later influences, which was then somewhat
marked, has relaxed. Novalis also has again become unknown to
many. At that time, however, these examples seemed significant
and important. Many coquetted in insipid poetry with religion,
believing they were akin to the profound Novalis, just as there were
advocates enough of the All in the One taken for followers of
Spinoza who were equally distant from their original. Novalis was
cried down as an enthusiastic mystic by the prosaic, and Spinoza as
godless by the literalists. It was incumbent upon me to protest
against this view of Spinoza, seeing I would review the whole sphere
of piety. Something essential would have been wanting in the ex-
position of my views ifI had not in some way said: that the mind and
heart of this great man seemed deeply influenced by piety, even
though it were not Christian piety. The result might have been
different, had not the Christianity of that time been so distorted and

obscured by dry formulas and vain subtilties that the divine form ©

could not be expected to win the regard of a stranger. This I said
in the first edition, somewhat youthfully indeed, yet so that I
have found nothing now needing to be altered, for there was no
reason to believe that I ascribed the Holy Spirit to Spinoza in the
special Christian sense of the word. As interpolation instead of
interpretation was not then so common or so honourable as at
present, I believed that a part of my work was well done. How was
I to expect that, because I ascribed piety to Spinoza, I would myself
be taken fora Spinozist ? Yet I had never defended his system, and
anything philosophic that was in my book was manifestly inconsis-
tent with the characteristics of his views and had quite a different
basis than the unity of substance. Even Jacobi has in his criticism
by no means hit upon what is most characteristic. When I recovered
my astonishment, in revising the second edition, this parallel occurred
tome. As it was known that Novalis in some points hada tendency
to Catholicism, I felt sure that, in praising his art, I should have his

EXPLANATIONS. 105

religious aberrations ascribed me as Spinozism had been because I
praised Spinoza’s piety. Whether my expectation has deceived me
I do not yet very well know.

(4) Page 46.—Even among the few who admit that religion
originally is feeling stirred in the highest direction, there will be
many to whom it will: appear ır that I assert too much when I say that
all healthy feelings are pious, or at least that, in order not to be
diseased, they should be pious. Even were this granted of all social
feelings, it must be shown how piety is to be found in all those feelings
that unite men for a higher or even a more sensuous enjoyment of life.
Yet I can retract nothing from the universality of the statement and

ey.

in no way admit that it was a rhetorical hyperbole. To take one
example, Protestantism can only completely and consistently defend
the domestic and paternal relations of the clergy against the
melancholy folly of the peculiar holiness of the celibate life, by
showing that wedded love and all foregoing natural attraction of
the sexes are not, in the nature of the case, absolutely inconsistent
with a pious state. This only happens when the feeling is diseased,
when there is a tendency in it to the rage of Bacchus or the folly of
Narcissus. In accordance with this analogy I believe that the same
could be shown of each department of feeling not inconsistent with
morality. But, if it be inferred from this passage that, as all true
human feelings belong to the religious sphere, all ideas and principles
of every sort are foreign to it, the connection seems to show my
meaning. ‚Religion itself is to be rigidly distinguished from what
merely belongs to TE even those feelings which are usually
separated from the religious sphere, require ideas for their commu-
nication and representation, and principles to exhibit their due
measure. But these „Principles and ideas do not belong to the
feelings themselves, and it is similar with the dogmatic and ascetic
in respect of religion, as is shown more fully further on.

(5) Page 49.—For understanding my whole view I could desire
nothing better than that my readers should compare these Speeches
with my “Christliche Glaubenslehre.” In form they are very
different and their - points of departure lie far apart, yet in matter
they are quite parallel. But to provide the Speeches for this
purpose with a complete commentary was impossible, and I must
content myself with single references to such passages as seem to
me capable of appearing contrary or at least of lacking agreement.
Thus every one perhaps might not find the description here given
of an action of things upon us underlying all religious emotions, in
agreement with the declaration which goes through the whole

106 SECOND SPEECH.

“Glaubenslehre,” that the essence of the religious emotions consists
in the feeling of an absolute dependence. The matter stands thus.
Even there it is admitted that we cannot really have this feeling
except it is occasioned by the action of single things. But if the
single things are in their action only single, the sole result is.
definiteness of the sensuous self-consciousness. In the “ Glaubens-
lehre,” likewise this is postulated as the substratum of religious
emotion. Yet, let the single thing be great or small, our single life
reacts against it, and there can be no feeling of dependence except
fortuitously in so far as the reaction is not equal to the action. If,
however, the single thing does not work upon us as a single thing,
but as part of the Whole, it will be, in acting upon us, an opening
for the Whöle. This result will depend entirely on the mood and
attitude of the mind. But then our reaction will appear to us
determined by the same cause and in the same way as the action,
änd being over against the Universe, our state must bethe feeling of
entire dependence. And this also showsthat however we exhibit the
World and God they cannot be divided. We do not feel ourselves
dependent on the Whole in so far as it is an aggregate of mutually
conditioned parts of which we ourselves are one, but only in so far
as underneath this coherence there is a unity conditioning all things
and conditioning our relations to the other parts of the Whole.
Only on this condition can the single thing be, as it is here put, an
exhibition of the Infinite, being so comprehended that its opposition
to all else entirely vanishes.

(6) Page 50.—By mythology I understand in general a purely ideal
subject enunciated in historical form. Exactly in accordance with
the analogy of Polytheistic Mythology, it seems to me that we have
a Monotheistic and a Christian. For this a dialogue of divine
persons, such as is found in Klopstock’s poems and elsewhere, is not
necessary. It is found in more rigid didactic form when something
is represented as happening in the Divine Being, as divine resolves
made in respect of something that has happened in the world, or
again to modify former resolves, not to speak of the special divine
resolves that give reality to the idea that prayer is heard. The
representations of many divine attributes also have this historical
form and are therefore mythological. The divine pity for example,
as the idea is mostly understood, is only,something when the divine
will that lightens the evil is separated from the will that ordained
it. Are both regarded as one, then one cannot limit the other, but
the divine will that decrees the evil, decrees it only in a definite
measure, and the idea of pity is out of place. Similarly, in the idea

EXPLANATIONS. 107

of the veracity of God, promise and fulfilment are separated, and
both together exhibit a historical transaction. But when the activity
that promises, is regarded as the same that accomplishes the fulfil-
ment, the conception of divine veracity is something only in so far
as many divine activities are linked or not to one expression of them.
In this distinction also a history is told, but if the activity that
brings to pass and its expression are regarded in general as one,
there is hardly place for a special idea of the divine veracity. The
same may be shown in other things. By applying this name to
them I in nowise blame these representations. Rather I acknow-
ledge them as indispensable, for otherwise the subject could not be
spoken of in such a way that any distinction could be drawn between
the more correct and less correct. Even in more scientific presenta-
tions of religion, the use of such mythology has no danger, for there
it is always incumbent to think away the historical and the time
form generally. In the sphere of religious poetry and oratory also
it is indispensable. There we have only to do with the like-minded,
and forthem the chief worth of those presentations is that by them
they communicate and realize their own religious moods. They
naturally at once adjust the defective expression. But I blame it
as vain mythology when this, that is only a help in need, is regarded
as exact knowledge, and treated as the essence of religion.

(7) Page 53.—If here the system of marks or attributes which in
its completest form composes the theological outline is represented
rather as being determined by outward circumstances than as coming
forth of itself from the religious capacity, the oft-repeated assertion,
so contemptuous of all historical sense, that the religious movements
which in Christianity have determined a great body of the most
important ideas, were merely accidental and the fruit of entirely
alien interests, is not to be made. I only wished to recall what is
also expounded in my “ Kurze Darstellung” and in the Introduction
to the “ Glaubenslehre,” that t he formation of the idea depends here,
as elsewhere, on the dominating language, the degree, manner, and
quality of its scientific development embracing of course the manner
and quality of the philosophizing. But in respect of religion in and
for itself, these are only external circumstances. Apart from the °
- universal, divine connection of all things, we can say, for example,
that if Christianity had had a great and preponderating Eastern
extension, the Hellenic and Western being, on the contrary, kept

back, without being essentially different, it might have been con-

tained in another type of doctrines.
(8) Page 54.—This passage also might occasion various miscon-

108 SECOND SPEECH.

ceptions. First, in respect of the opposition between true and false
religion, I refer to my “ Glaubenslehre,” §§ 7 and 8 (2nd edit.). It
is there treated fully, and I would simply add that, in religion, error
man’s religion is his highest truth. Error therein would not only be
error, it would be hypocrisy. In religion then everything is imme-
diately true, as nothing is expressed at any moment of it, except the
state of mind of the religious person. Similarly, all types of religious
association are good, for the best in the existence of each man must
be stored up in them. But how little this prejudices the superiority
of one type of faith to another is in part plainly stated and in part
easy to infer. One may bethe utterance of a superior state of mind,
or there may be in the religious communion a higher spiritual power
and love. Furthermore, the rejection here of the thought of the
universality of any one religion and the assertion that only in the
sum of all religions is the whole extent of this bias of the mind
~ comprehended, in no way expresses a doubt that Christianity will be
able to extend itself over the whole human race, though perhaps
among many races, this greatest of all religions may suffer im-
portant changes. Just as little did this passage express a wish that
other religions should always continue alongside of Christianity.
The influence of Judaism and Hellenic Heathenism on Christianity
was through a long period visible in hostile, raging commotions.
Thus both still appear in Christianity, and therefore in the his-
tory of Christianity have a place. The same thing would happen if
Christianity should annex the territory of all existing great religions.
Consequently the religious sphere would not be enclosed in
narrower borders, but all religions would in a historical way be
visible in Christianity. From the connection again it is clear that I
only deny that a religion is universally true in the sense that every-
thing that exists or has existed outside of it, is not to be called
religion at all. Similarly, what follows is to be understood, about
every truly pious person willingly acknowledging that to other types
of religion much belongs for which the sense fails him. Even if
Christianity had supplanted all other religions, he would not have
a sense for all that would thereby be historically mirrored in
Christianity, for just as little then as now would the Christianity of
all Christian people be quite the same. And if no one has an
adequate sense for all that is Christian, there can be none with the
sense for all there is in other religions that may be the germ of some
future Christian peculiarity.

(9) Page 55.—There are still Christian divines who reject the whole

a a TD _

EXPLANATIONS, 109

purpose of Christian dogmatics, and there was a far greater number
when this passage was first written. They believe that Christianity
would have been a healthier development and would have shown a
freer, fairer form if no one had ever thought of presenting the
Christian conceptions in a finished connection. Hence they labour
to prune it, to abolish it, as much as possible, and to have it acknow-
ledged as merely a collection of monographs, as an accidental
aggregate of single theses of very unequal value. Their good in-
tentions I do not question, but even then, I was far removed from
agreeing with them. would be a_ grave misunderstanding to
believe that this invective against the mania for system makes light
of the endeavour to present the Christian faith in the closest possible
connection. The mania for system is merely a morbid degeneration
of this praiseworthy and wholesome endeavour. That systematic
treatment of religious conceptions.is.the best which, on the one
side, does no not take the conception and the idea for original and con-
stitutive, and on the other, that the living mobility of the letter be
secured, that it may not die and the spirit be drawn to death with it.
Within the great conformity characteristic difference is not only to
be endured, it is to be assigned its place. If this were to be taken
for the chief aim in my presentation of the Christian faith, I would
fain believe that I am in perfect agreement with myself.

(10) Page 55.—I feel that this passage gives a two-fold, grave
offence. First I prefer Heathen Rome, on account of its boundless
mixture of religions, to Christian Rome which, in comparison, I call
godless, and that I condemn the expulsion of heretics, while I myself
declare certain views to be heretical, and even seek to systematize
heresy. I begin with the latter as the deeper and more important.
It does not appear to me possible that there can be a sound dogmatic
procedure without a formula of the character of what is Christian,
by the application of which it would be possible, from any point of
the line of cleavage, to cut off the ordinates, and so to describe the
extent of Christian conceptions by approximation. It naturally
follows that what lies outside of this extent, and would yet be con-
sidered Christian, is what has long been called in the Christian
Church heretical. In my dogmatics I could not avoid offering such
a formula, and I can only wish to attain my object as fully as
possible. But this definition of the subject has nothing to do with
the treatment of } of ‘persons. 3. That many, while contending for the
defence of their ow: own opinion, may use a heretical expression without
meaning anything heretical, is apparent, and I have declared myself
fully on it in the “ Glaubenslehre,” $ 22, 3 and note, and $ 25, note.

110 SECOND SPEECH.

On many sides the wish has been expressed in the Evangelical
Church to renew church discipline in a judicious manner that a
Christian congregation may be in a position to withdraw a measure

of fellowship from persons disproving by their lives their Christian _

disposition. This makes it specially necessary to obviate the con-
fusion between this proceeding and the right to pronounce the bann
on all we may choose to consider heretics. If heretics are not also
without a Christian disposition, the Evangelical Church will rather
acknowledge that its sole duty towards them is to maintain fellow-
ship with them that, by mutual understanding, they may the sooner
be led into the right way. If individuals or small societies employ a
contrary method and, regardless of disposition, exclude from their
fellowship all who do not agree with them in the same letter of
doctrine, they do not act in an Evangelical spirit, but assume an
authority our church grants to none. And now passing to the
second point, my preference of Heathen to Christian Rome, and my
statement that through tolerance the former was full of gods, and
that through persecution of heretics, the latter was godless. First,
the character of the expressions used shows that this passage bears
specially the rhetorical cast of the book. What, however, is to be
taken literally is that the dogmatizing love of system which scorns
to assign its place to difference, but rather excludes all difference,
plainly suppresses, as much as it can, the living knowledge of God,
and changes doctrine into a dead letter. A rule so rigid that it
condemns everything of another shade, crushes out productiveness.
As this alone contains living knowledge of God, the system itself
must become dead. This is the history of the Roman Catholic
system in contrast to the Protestant. From this point of view the
rise of the Evangelical Church was simply to rescue its own pro-
ductiveness from fellowship with such a rule. My praise of the
receptivity of ancient Rome for strange worships is also to be taken
seriously. It involved an acknowledgment of the narrowness and
one-sidedness of each individualized Polytheism, and the desire to
free the religious need from the limits of political forms. Now these
two things were not only praiseworthy in themselves, but were much
more favourable to the spread of Christianity than heresy hunting,
however well meant, could ever be for its establishment and pre-
servation.

(11) Page 65.—In the “ Glaubenslehre,” also § 8, note 1, I have de-
clared myself against the opinion that idolatry, embracing, according
to the somewhat perspective usage of the Holy Scriptures, all kinds
of Polytheism, has arisen from fear. There, however, I wished to

ee ee ae Bi a Mn un Finke

FO

EXPLANATIONS. ioe

show that, in essence, the lower and the higher stages of religion
were alike, which could not be if the former arose from fear and
the latter did not. There I am dealing with the conception that
piety generally has had its source in fear. Despite the somewhat
variable use of decordaipovia, the proof here given in general would
apply to the particular instance, for it could not be said of the Greek
and Roman Polytheists that their faith in the gods would have been
extinct if, in the courageous use of life, they had shaken off all fear.
Similarly, what is said there may here be applied generally, for if fear
is notin some way a perversion of love, it can only regard its object as
malevolent. Where then higher beings are not worshipped or rather
entreated as bad, the motive cannot be fear entirely separated from
love. Hence it remains true that in all religions from the beginning
love is operative, and all growth towards perfection is simply a pro-
gressive purification of love.

(12) Page 65.—It should hardly be necessary to justify the use of
the expression World-Spirit where I wish to indicate the object of
pious adoration in a_way that would include all different forms and
stages of religion. In particular, I do not believe it can be said with
justice that, by this choice of expression, I have sacrificed the interests
of the most perfect form of religion to the inferior. On the con-
trary, I believe, not only that it is a perfectly Christian name for
the Highest Being, but that the expression could only have arisen on
Monotheistic soil, and is as free from Jewish Particularism as from
the incompleteness of the Mohammedan Monotheism which I have
attempted to specify in the “ Glaubenslehre,” § 8, 4. No one will
confuse it with World-Soul. It t neither expresses reciprocal action
between the World and the Highest . Being, nor any kind of indepen-
dence of the World from Him. I believe therefore that Christian
authors are justified in using the term, even though it has not
directly proceeded from the special standpoint of Christianity.

(13) Page 71.—In my “ Glaubenslehre,” the Introduction of which

contains the outlines of what I take to be the philosophy of religion,
and therefore has many points of contact with this book, my chief
division was into what I have called the zsthetic and the teleological
form. Here another ground of classification seems to be assumed.
The peculiar world of religion seems to be the mind, regarded as an
individual thing having one or more things standing over against it
—the mind in our sphere and at our stage of culture. In the same
way on the other side, as there indicated, the world of religion may
be external nature. Two things there rigidly distinguished seem
here to be both ascribed to the religion of the mind, for whether the

112 SECOND SPEECH.

active state be referred to the passive, or the passive to the active,
all religious emotions are states of mind, Hence the distinction that
is here regarded as the higher, is there quite overlooked. By a
natural religion, however, I do not mean that religious emotions
can come to man through contemplation of the external world.
This contemplation is exalted by speculative natural science, which,
however, always remains science, and only gives rise to ‘religious
emotions in proportion as the soul is conscious of itself in the con-
templation, and therefore again by the mental state. “In the same
way they arise from the immediate relation of nature to our life and
existence, only in proportion to its effect upon our mood at any
moment, and therefore, again from the mental state.- The classifica-
tion given in the “ Glaubenslehre ” therefore remains. The religious
emotions, whether from nature or the historical life, have all this
two-fold form. If the influence of the contemplation of nature is re-
ferred to the soul and its activities and its laws, it has a teleological
or ethical character ; if it is referred to nature, it has an sesthetic
character.

(14) Page 72.—This is only to be taken as an application of the
narrative, not as the author’s own opinion. I believe it can be shown
that the narrative necessarily implies that neither can man come to
a consciousness of God, nor can he form general ideas, until he has
gained a consciousness of the species, of his subordination as an in-
dividual in it and his difference from it. And, it appears as clearly,
that neither the consciousness of the Highest Being, nor the en-
deavour to order the world for itself can be quite lost to the soul till
the consciousness of the species has quite vanished.

I will here also explain two passages not specially marked in the
text. On page 79 humility, formerly given as a natural form of
religious emotion, is spoken of as if it were opposed to an exalted
feeling of personal existence, and contrition, similarly depicted as
natural and essential to piety, as if it must be changed to joyful self-
sufficiency. Now, I do not consider that a contradiction, for I think
that all pious emotions both exalt and debase. Even in Christianity
that spreads itself only by awaking the emotions that debase,
penitence is quenched in the consciousness of the divine forgiveness.
The words “ satisfy thyself with my mercy,” express just that very
joyful self-sufficiency here meant. The opposite feeling to humility,
the feeling that in each one the whole of humanity lives and works
is just the consciousness to which the Christian of all men should
rise. He should feel that all believers form a living organic whole,
wherein not only is each member, as Paul puts it, indispensable to

EXPLANATIONS. 113

all the others. But each one presupposes the characteristic activity
of all the others. Further, when it is said that a man who
has thus combined both forms of emotion needs no mediator any
more, but can himself be a mediator for many, this statement is only
to be taken in the limited meaning indicated by earlier expositions,
namely, each man has not in himself the right key for understand-
ing all men. To almost everyone much is so alien that he can only
acknowledge it when he finds it in a form more akin to himself or
linked to something else that has a special value for him. In this
sense, therefore, those who unite the most alien elements with those
most acknowledged, mediate an understanding. Chiefly in that feel-
ing which is in contrast to humility, the self-consciousness advances
to such transparency and accuracy that the most distant ceases to
appear strange and ceases to repel. But this feeling will be purest
when all human limits are seen in Him from whom all limitation
was banished. Hence there is here no derogation from the higher
mediatorship of the Redeemer.

(15) Page 85.—Without wishing to retract anything from the
leading position in this Speech, which is that all higher feelings
belong to religion, or to deny that single actions should not proceed
directly from stimulus of single feelings, I would say that this passage
is specially applicable only to the ethics of that time, to Kant and
Fichte, and particularly Kant. So long as ethics adhered to the im-
perative method so rigidly followed in those systems, feelings could
find no place in morals, for there could not be a command, thou shalt
have this or that feeling. Such a system should logically say of
them all only what has been said of friendship, that man must have

no time to begin it or to cherish it. But ethics should not be re-
_ stricted to the narrow imperative form. It should assign to these
feelings their place in the human soul. It should also acknowledge
their ethical worth, not as something that can or ought to be made
for some purpose and for which guidance is given in morals, but as a
free, natural function of.the higher life in close connection with the
higher maxims and modes of acting. Ethics would then so far
embrace religion, just asa presentation of religion would embrace
ethics, yet both would not be on that account one and the same.

(16) Page 89.—The expression here employed that miracle is only
the religious name for event, and that all that happens is miracle
might easily be suspected of being a practical denial of the miraculous,
for if everything is a miracle then nothing is. This stands in close
connection with the explanations given in the “ Glaubenslehre,” § 14
note, $ 34,2, 3and $47. Ifthe reference of an event to the Divine

I

114 SECOND SPEECH.

omnipotence and the contemplation of it in its natural connection
do not exclude one another but may be parallel, which view is first
taken depends upon the direction of the attention. Where the bear-
ing of an event on our aims most interests us, and the examination
of the connection goes too much into details, the divine provision
will be least observed and the course of nature best. But which of
the two views will most satisfy us depends on the one side, on how
certain we are that we have grasped the full meaning of the event, so
that we can say with some assurance that this is willed of God, and
on the other how deeply we can penetrate into ‘the natural connec-
tion. All this is mere subjective difference. Hence itis plainly true
that all the events that most awake religious attention, and in which
at the same time the natural connection is most hidden, are most
regarded as miracle. Yet it is equally true that in themselves and
in respect of the divine causality all events alike are miracle. As in
the expositions of the “ Glaubenslehre,” though absolute miracle is
rejected, the religious interest in the miraculous is acknowledged and
guarded, so here I merely seek to exhibit miracle in its purity and to
remove all foreign ingredients which are more akin to stupid amaze-
ment than to the joyful anticipation of a higher meaning.
17) Page 90.—It is difficult to treat an idea like the effects of grace,
which is scarcely at all current except in a peculiarly Christian form,
in such a general way as to embrace everything analogous to be
found in other religious forms. To it belongs all that distinguishes
a human being as a special favourite of the gods. Revelation is
more receptivity, inspiration more productivity. Now both are
combined in the idea of grace, and pious persons are always
characterized by both. In what follows, however, the expression
entrance of the world into man is substituted for revelation, and the
original outgoing of man into the world for inspiration. The latter
will admit of little doubt, for every inspiration must go forth and
accomplish something in the world, and everything original must be
at least occasioned from without, and for the: most part is regarded
as inspiration. The former also is in agreement with the preceding
explanation of revelation, and because here it was necessary to make
it general it could not otherwise be conceived. Yet it may easily be
charged to it that, for the sake of the less perfect forms of religion,
it puts the Christian in the background. But it is not to be over-
looked that the idea of the Deity does not enter our consciousness ex-
cept along with the idea of the World, and that this entrance is looked
upon religiously, not speculatively, is shown sufficiently further on.
(18) Page 94.—By what is said in my “ Glaubenslehre,” § 3-5, I

EXPLANATIONS. 115

trust that what is here said, and especially the statement that all
pious emotions exhibit through feeling the immediate presence of God

nus, may be set in a clearer light. It is hardly necessary to remind

you that the existence of God generally can only be active, and as

there can be no passive existence of God, the divine activity upon

any object is the divine existence in respect of that object. It may,
höwever, require to be explained why I represent the unity of our
being in contrast to the multiplicity of function, as the divine in
us. And you may ask why I say of this unity that it appears in the
emotions of piety, seeing it can be shown from other manifestations
also that self-consciousness is but a single function. In respect of
the former the divine in us must be that in which the capacity to be
conscious of God has its seat. Even were the criticisms just, it
might still be the divine that 1s awakened in usin the pious emotions,
and that is here the main point. For the rest, the unity of our being
cannot, certainly, appear by itself, for it is absolutely inward. Most
immediately it appears in the self-consciousness, in so far as single
references are in the background. On the other hand, when
references to single things are most prominent, the self-conscious-
ness then most appears as a single function.

(19) Page 95,—This exposition also, it is hoped, will be made
clearer and at the same time be completed by what is said in the
“ Glaubenslehre,” especially in § 8, note 2. As everyone can compare
them, it is not necessary for me to enter on a defence of myself
against the supposition—I would not willingly call it accusation—
which men whom I greatly honour, and some of whom have already
gone hence, have drawn from this Speech. For myself I am supposed
to prefer the impersonal form of thinking of the Highest Being,
and this has been called now my atheism and again my Spinozism.
I, however, thought that it is truly Christian to seek for piety every-
where, and to acknowledge it under every form. I find, at least,
that Christ enjoined this upon his disciples, and that Paul obeyed
not only among the Jews and the Proselytes, but among the
Heathen at Athens. WhenI had said in all simplicity, that it is
still not indifferent whether one does not acquire or quite rejects a
definite form of representing the Highest Being, and thereby obstructs
generally the growth of his piety, I did not think it necessary to
protest further against all consequences. I did not remember how
often a person going straightforward seems to be going to the left
to a person going to the right. But none who reflect on the little
that is said about pantheism will suspect me of any materialistic
pantheism. And if any one look at it rightly, he will find that, on

12

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116 SECOND SPEECH.

the one side, every one must recognize it as an almost absolute
necessity for the highest stage of piety to acquire the conception of a
personal God, and on the other he will recognize the essential im-
perfection in the conception of a personality of the Highest Being,
nay, how hazardous it is, if it is not most carefully.kept pure. The
conception is necessary whenever one would interpret to himself or
to others immediate religious emotions, or whenever the heart has
immediate intercourse with the Highest Being. Yet the profoundest
of the church fathers have ever sought to purify the idea. Were the
definite expressions they have used to clear away what is human
and limited in the form of personality put together, it would be as
easy to say that they denied personality to God as that they ascribed
it to Him. Asit is so difficult to think of a personality as truly
infinite and incapable of suffering, a great distinction should be
drawn between a personal God anda living God. The latter idea
alone distinguishes from materialistic pantheism and atheistic blind
necessity. Within that limit any further wavering in respect of
personality must be left to the representative imagination and the
dialectic conscience, and where the pious sense exists, they will guard
each other. Does the former fashion a too human personality, the
latter restrains by exhibiting the doubtful consequences; does the
latter limit the representation too much by negative formulas, the
former knows how to suit it to its need. I was specially concerned
to show that, if one form of the conception does not in itself exclude
all piety, the other as little necessarily includes it. How many men
are there in whose lives piety has little weight and influence, for
whom this conception of personality is indispensable as a general
supplement to their chain of causality which on both sides is broken
off ; and how many, on the other hand, show the deepest piety who, in
what they say of the Highest Being, have never rightly developed the
idea of personality !

(20) Page 99.—This passage is different from the former edition.
Partly the statement that morality generally cannot be manipulated,
though right in the connection, seemed to require closer definition
if there was not to be misunderstanding; partly the whole view
seemed to me only rightly completed by the addition that freedom
and morality would be endangered by the prospect of divine recom-
pense. In the strife on this point, especially as it is carried on
between the Kantians and the Eudaimonists, the great difference
between presenting divine recompense as an inducement and using
it theoretically to explain the order of the world has very often been
overlooked. The former is an immoral and therefore specially an

EXPLANATIONS. 117

unchristian procedure, and is never employed by true heralds of
Christianity and has no place in the Scriptures ; the other is natural
and necessary, for it alone shows how the divine law extends over
the whole nature of man, and so far from causing a rift in human
nature, it most fully guardsits unity. But this explanation will be
very different in proportion as love of truth and desire of knowledge
are free from all foreign ingredients. Itis hardly to be denied that
the demands of self-love will most claim arbitrariness for the divine
recompense, and as arbitrariness can only have its seat in personality,
it will be accompanied by the narrowest conceptions of the divine
personality. :

(21) Page 101.—This passage has met very much the same fate as
the passage which treated of the personality of God. It was also
directed against narrow and impure conceptions and it has raised
the same misunderstandings. I am supposed to disparage the hope
of immortality in the usual sense of the word, representing it as a
weakness and contending against it. But this was not the place to
declare myself in respect of the truth of the matter, or to offer the
view of it which I, as a Christian, hold. This will be found in the
second part of my “ Glaubenslehre,” and both passages should
supplement each other. There I had only to answer the question
whether this hope was so essential to a pious direction of the mind
that the two stood or fell together. What could I do but answer in the
negative, seeing it is now usually accepted that the people of the old
Covenant did not, in earlier times, have this hope, and seeing also
that it is easy to show that, in the state of pious emotion, the soul is
rather absorbed in the present moment than directed towards the
future? Only it appears hard that this Speech should deduce not
doubtfully the hope so widely diffused among the noblest men of a
restoration of the individual life not again to be interrupted, from
the lowest stage of self-love, seeing it might as well have been
ascribed to the interest of love in the beloved objects. All the
forms under which the hope of immortality can present itself
as the highest self-consciousness of the spirit being before me,
just in contrast to the opponents of the faith it seemed to me
natural and necessary to utter the warning that any particular way
of conceiving immortality and especially that which has unmistak-
able traces of a lower interest hidden behind it, is not to be confused
with the reality. I thus sought to prepare for grasping the question,
not as it is entirely limited to personality or to a self-consciousness
chained to single affinities, but as it is natural in one in whom
personal interest is purified by subordination to a self-consciousness

118 SECOND SPEECH.

that is ennobled by the consciousness of the human race and of human
nature. On the other side, in order to avoid endless and wide-
spreading explanations, it was necessary to make the opponents of
religion observe that there could be no religious discussion of this
matter except among those who have already cultivated in them-
selves the. higher life, given by true piety, which is worthy to
conquer death. If I am somewhat severe on the self-deception of
a mean way of thinking and feeling, which is proud that it can
comprehend immortality and that it is guided by the accompanying
hope and fear, I can only say in self-defence that there is nothing of
mere rhetorie in it, butthatit has always been with me a very strong
feeling. I desire no more than that each man, if he would test his
piety, should see, not merely, as Plato says, that souls appear before
the judges of the Underworld stripped of all alien ornament con-
ferred by the external relations of life, but, laying aside these claims
to endless existence and considering himself just as he is, that he
then decide whether these claims are anything more than the titles of
lands, never possessed and never to be possessed, wherewith the great
ones of the earth often think they must adorn themselves. If, thus
stripped, he still find that that eternal life is with him to which the
end of this Speech points, he will readily understand what Iam aim-
ing at in my presentation of the Christian faith. Furthermore, the
parallel between the two ideas of God and immortality in respect of
the different ways of conception here indicated, is not to be over-
looked. The most anthropomorphic view of God usually presupposes
a morally corrupt consciousness, and the same holds of such a con-
ception of immortality as pictures the Elysian fields as just a more
beautiful and wider earth. As there is a great difference between
inability to think of God as in this way personal and the inability to
think of a living God atall, so there is between one who does not
hold such a sensuous conception of immortality and one who does
not hope for any immortality. As we call everyone pious who
believes in a living God, so without excluding any kind or manner we
would hold the same of those who believe in an eternal life of the
spirit.

NE ee

THIRD SPEECH.
THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION.

As I myself have willingly confessed, the endeavour to
make proselytes from unbelievers is deep rooted in the
character of religion. Yet that is not what now urges
me to speak to you of the cultivation of man for this
noble capacity. For this cultivation we believers know of
.only one means—the free expression and communication
of religion. When religion moves in a man with all its
native force, when it carries every faculty of his spirit
imperiously along in the stream of its impulse, we expect
it to penetrate into the hearts of all who live and
breathe within its influence. Every corresponding element
being stirred by this life-giving power, they should attain
a consciousness of their existence, and the attentive ear
should be gladdened by an answering note of kindred
sound. Where the pious person fails to awake a life
like his by the natural expression of his own life, he will
despise nobly every strange charm, every exercise of force,
in the calm conviction that the time has not yet come
for anything congenial to appear.

The unsuccessful issue is not new to any of us. How
often have I struck up the music of my religion, seeking
to move ths bystanders! Beginning with single soft
notes, I have soon been swept on by youthful impetuosity
to the fullest harmony of the religious feelings, But
nothing stirred, nothing answered in the hearers. I have
entrusted these words to a larger and more versatile

120 THIRD SPEECH.

circle, yet from how many, despite of those advantages,
will they return in sadness without having been under-
stood, yea, without having awaked the vaguest suspicion
of their purpose!. And how often, for all who proclaim
religion, and for me along with them, will this fate which
has been appointed us from the beginning, be renewed !
Yet this shall never distress us. The difficulty we know
may not otherwise be met, and we shall never be moved
from our quiet equanimity to attempt in any other fashion
to force our way of thinking either upon this or the
future generation. |

Everyone of us misses in himself not a little that
belongs to a complete humanity, and many lack much.
What wonder, then, if the number in whom religion
refuses to develope should be great! Necessarily it must
be great, else how could we come to see it in—if I
might so say—its incarnate, historical existence, or dis-
cern the bounds it sets on all sides to the other capacities
of man, or how by them again it is in manifold ways
bounded. Or how should we know how far man can
anywhere succeed without it, and where it sustains him
and forwards him; or guess that, without his knowledge,
it is busy in him.

But especially in these times of universal confusion and
upheaval, it is natural that its slumbering spark should
not glow up in many, however lovingly or patiently we
tend it, and that, even in persons in whom under happier
circumstances it would have broken through all obstacles,
it is not brought to life. In all human things nothing
remains unshaken. Every man must continually face the
possibility of having to abandon the very belief that
determines his place in the world and binds him to the
earthly order of things. And he may find no other, but
may sink in the general whirlpool.’ One class shun no
concentration oftheir own powers and shout also towards
every side for help, that they may hold fast what they take

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 121

to be the poles of the world and of society, of art and of
science, which by an indescribable destiny, as it were of
their own accord, suddenly leap from their sockets and
allow all that has so long revolved around them to fall ;
the other class, with a like restless zeal, are busy clearing
away the ruins.of fallen centuries, seeking to be the first to
settle on the fruitful ground that is being formed beneath
from the quickly cooling lava of the dread volcano.

Even without leaving his place, every man is so mightily
affected by the vehement shaking of all things that, in the
universal giddiness, he must be glad to fix his eye steadily
enough on any one object, to be able to keep to it and con-
vince himself gradually that something still stands. In
such a state of things it would be foolish to expect that
many could be fit to cultivate and retain religious feelings
which prosper best in quiet. In the midst of this ferment,
indeed, the aspect of the moral world is more majestic and
noble than ever, and at moments there are hints of more
significant traits than ever before in the centuries. Yet
who can rescue himself from the universal turmoil? Who
can escape the power of narrower interests? Who has
calm enough to stand still and steadfastness enough for
undisturbed contemplation ?

But suppose the happiest times and suppose the best
will not only to arouse by communication the capacity for
religion where it does exist, but, by every possible way,
to ingraft and to impart it. Where, then, is there such a
way? All that the activity and art of one man can do for
another is to communicate conceptions to be the basis of
thoughts, and so far to associate them with his own ideas
that they may be remembered at fitting times. But no
one can arrive at the point of making others think what
thoughts he will. There is a contrariety that cannot be
eliminated from words, and much less can you get beyond
this means and freely produce what inner activity you
will. In short, on the mechanism of the spirit everyone

122 THIRD SPEECH.

can, in some measure, work, but into its organization, into
the sacred workshop of the Universe, no one can enter at
pleasure. No one can change or disarrange, take from
oraddto. Atthe most he may, by means of this mechanism,
retard the development of the spirit. Part of the growth
may thus be violently mutilated, but nothing can be
moulded. From this sanctuary of his organization which
force cannot enter, all that pertains to the true life of man,
all that should be an ever alert, operative impulse in him,
proceeds.

And such is religion. In the spirit it inhabits it is un-
interruptedly active and strong, making everything an
object for itself and turning every thought and action into
a theme for its heavenly phantasy. Like everything
else, then, that should be ever present, ever active in the
human soul, it lies far beyond the domain of teaching and
imparting. Instruction in religion, meaning that piety
itself is teachable, is absurd and unmeaning. Our opinions
and doctrines we can indeed communicate, if we have
words and our hearers have the comprehending, imagining
power of the understanding. But we know very well that
those things are only the shadows of our religious emotions,
and if our pupils do not share our emotions, even though
they do understand the thought, they have no possession
that can truly repay their toil. This retreat into oneself,
there to perceive oneself, cannot be taught, Even the
most inspired person who can see, it matters not before
what object he finds himself, the original light of the
Universe, cannot by the word of instruction transfer this
power and dexterity to another.

There is, indeed, an imitative talent which in some
perhaps we can so far arouse as to make it easy for them,
when sacred feelings are represented in powerful tones, to
produce in themselves somewhat similar emotions. But
does that touch their deepest nature? Is it, in the true
sense of the word, religion? If you would compare the

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 123

sense for the Universe with the sense for art, you must not
compare the possessors of a passive religiousness—if you
care so to name it—with those who, without producing
works of art themselves, are responsive to everything that
has to do with viewing them. The works of art of religion
are always and everywhere exposed. The whole world is a
gallery of religious scenes, and every man finds himself in
the midst of them. Wherefore, you must liken them to
persons who cannot be made to feel till commentaries and
imaginings on works of art are brought as medicinal
charms for the deadened sense, and who even then only
lisp, in an ill-understood terminology, some inappropriate
words that are not their own. So much and no more you
can accomplish by mere teaching. This is the goal of all
conscious educating and exercising in such things. Show
me one man to whom. you have imparted power of judg-
ment, the spirit of observation, feeling for art or morality,
then will I pledge myself to teach religion also.

Of course there is in religion a mastership and a
discipleship. But this attachment is no blind imitation.
It is not the master that makes disciples, but he is their
master because of their choice." And if, by the utterance
of our own religion, religion is awakened in others, we
cannot retain it in our power or attach it to ourselves.
As soon as it lives, their religion also is free and goes its
own way. On blazing up in the soul, the sacred spark
spreads to a free and living flame, fed by its own atmo-
sphere. More or less it illumines for the soul the whole
circuit of the world, so that, following his own impulse, he
may settle far away from the place where first the new life
was lit. Compelled simply by the feeling of weakness and
finitude, by an original, inward determination to settle in
some definite quarter, without being ungrateful to his first
guide, he makes choice of that climate which suits him
best. There he seeks for himself a centre, and moving self-
limited in his new course, of his own choice and spontaneous

124 THIRD SPEECH.

liking, he calls himself the disciple of him who first settled
in this dear spot and showed its splendour.?

I do not, therefore, aim at training either you or others.
to religion. Nor would I teach you by resolve or rule to
train yourselves. I would not leave the sphere of religion
—as by doing so I would—but a little longer I would
tarry with you within. The Universe itself trains its own
observers and admirers, and how that comes to pass we
shall now see, as far as it can be seen.

You know how each element of humanity discloses
itself by the place it maintains against the others. By
this universal strife everything in every man attains a
determinate form and size. Now this strife is only sus-
tained by the fellowship of the single elements, by the
movement of the Whole. Hence every man and every
thing in every man is a work of the Whole. This is the
only way in which the pious sense can conceive man.
Now I wish to return to the religious limitation of our
contemporaries which you praise and I bewail. I wish to
regard it in this aspect and to make it clear why we are
thus and not otherwise, and what must happen if our limits
are to be widened. Would that I could at the same time make
you conscious that you also by your being and doing are
tools of the Universe, and that your deed, towards quite
other things directed, has an influence upon the present
state of religion.

Man is born with the religious capacity as with every
other. If only his sense for the profoundest depths of his
own nature is not crushed out, if only all fellowship
between himself and the Primal Source is not quite shut
off, religion would, after its own fashion, infallibly
be developed. But in our time, alas! that is exactly
what, in very large measure, does happen. With pain
I see daily how the rage for calculating and explaining
suppresses the sense. I see how all things unite to bind
man to the finite, and to a very small portion of the finite,

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 125

that the infinite may as far as possible vanish from his
eyes.

Who hinders the prosperity of religion ? Not you, not
the doubters and scoffers. Hven Sough you were all of
one mind to, have no religion, you would not disturb Nature
in her purpose of producing piety from the depths of the
soul, for your influence could only later find prepared soil.
Nor, as is supposed, do the immoral most hinder the pros-
perity of religion, for it is quite a different power to which
their endeavours are opposed. But the discreet and prac-
tical men of to-day are, in the present state of the world,
the foes of religion, and their great ‘preponderance is the
cause why it plays such a poor and insignificant réle, for
from tender childhood they maltreat man, crushing out his
higher aspirations.

With great reverence I regard the longing of young
minds for the marvellous and supernatural. Joyfully taking
in the motley show of things, they seek at the same time
something else to set over against it. They search every-
where for something surpassing the accustomed phenomena
and the light play of life. However many earthly objects
are presented for their knowing, there seems still another
sense unnourished. That is the first stirrings of religion.
A secret, inexplicable presentiment urges them past the
riches of this world. Every trace of another is welcome to
them, and they delight themselves in fictions of unearthly
beings. All that it is most evident to them cannot be
here, they embrace with that strong and jealous love
devoted to objects, the right to which is strongly felt, but
cannot be established. True, it is a delusion to seek the
Infinite immediately outside of the finite, but is it not
natural in those who know but the surface of even the finite
and sensuous? Is it not the delusion of whole peoples and
whole schools of wisdom ?

Were there but guardians of religion among those who
care for the young, how easily could this natural error be

126 THIRD SPEECH.

corrected! And, in clearer times, how greedily would
young souls then abandon themselves to the impressions
of the Infinite in its omnipresence !

It were even better if life were left quietly to take its
own course. Let it be supposed that the taste for gro-
tesque figures is as natural to the young imagination in
religion as in art, and let it be richly satisfied. Have no
anxiety when the earnest and sacred mythology, that is
considered the very essence of religion, is immediately
united with the careless games of childhood. Suppose that
the Heavenly Father, the Saviour, the angels are but
another kind of fairies and sylphs. In many, perhaps, the
foundation may be laid for an insufficient and dead letter.
While the images grow pale, the word, as the empty frame |
in which they have been fixed, may remain hanging. But
man, thus treated, would be more left to himself, and a
right-thinking, uncorrupted soul that knew how to keep
himself free from the titillation of scraping and scheming,
would more easily find, in due time, the natural issue from
this labyrinth. .

Now, on the contrary, that tendency is, from the begin-
ning, forcibly suppressed. Everything mysterious and
marvellous is proscribed. Imagination is not to be filled
with airy images! It is just as easy to store the memory
with real objects and to be preparing for life! Poor young
souls, desiring quite other fare, are wearied with moral tales
and have to learn how beautiful and necessary it is to be
genteel and discreet. The current conceptions of things
that they would of themselves have encountered soon
enough, are impressed upon them, as if it were an urgent
business that could never be too soon accomplished.
Without regard to their real want, there is given them that
of which far too soon there will be too much.

In proportion as man must busy himself in a narrow way
with a single object, to rescue the universality of the sense
an impulse awakes in everyone to allow the dominating

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 127

activity and all its kindred to rest, and to open all organs
to the influence of all impressions. By a secret and most
helpful sympathy this impulse is strongest when the general
life reveals itself most clearly in our own breasts and in the
surrounding world. But to yield to this impulse in com-
fortable inactivity cannot be permitted, for, from the
middle-class standpoint, it would be laziness and idling.
In everything there must be design and aim; somewhat
has always to be performed, and if the spirit can no more
serve, the body must be exercised. Work and play, but no
quiet, submissive contemplation !

But most of all, men are to be taught to analyze and
explain. By this explaining they are completely cheated
of their sense, for, as it is conducted, it is absolutely
opposed to any perceptive sense. Sense of its own accord
seeks objects for itself, it advances to meet them and it
offers to embrace them. It communicates something to
them which distinguishes them as its possession, its work,

It will find and be found. But this explaining knows
nothing of this living acquisition, of this illuminating truth,
of the true spirit of discovery in childlike intuition. But
from first to last, objects are to be transcribed accurately
in thought as something simply given. They are, God be
thanked, for all men ever the same, and who knows how long
already they have been docketed in good order with all
their qualities defined. Take them, then, only as life
brings them, and understand that and nothing more. But'to
seek for yourselves and to wish to have living intercourse
with things is eccentric and high-flown. It is a vain
endeavour, availing nothing in human life, where things
are only to be seen and handled as they have already pre-
sented themselves.

Fruitful in human life this endeavour is not, except that,
without it, an active life, resting on true inward culture, is
not to be found. The sense strives to comprehend the un-
divided impress of something whole; it will perceive what

128 THIRD SPEECH.

each thing is and how it is ; it will know everything in its
peculiar character. But that is not what they mean by
understanding. What and how are too remote for them,
around whence and to what end, they eternally circle,
They seek to grasp nothing in and for itself, but only in
special aspects, and therefore, not as awhole, but only piece-
meal. To inquire or thoroughly examine whether the
object they would understand is a whole, would lead them
too far. Were this their desire, they could hardly escape
so utterly without religion.

But all must be used for some excellent purpose, where-
fore they dissever and anatomize. This is how they deal
with what exists chiefly for the highest satisfaction of
the sense, with what, in their despite, isa whole in itself, I
mean with all that is art in nature and in the works of
man. Before it can operate they annihilate it by explain-
ing it in detail. Having first by decomposition robbed
it of its character as art, they would teach and impress this
or that lesson from the fragments.

You must grant that this is the practice of our people of
understanding, and you must confess that a superabundance
of sense is necessary if anything is to escape this hostile
treatment. On that account alone the number must be
small who are capable of such a contemplation of any
object as might awake in them religion.

But this development is still more checked. The utmost
is done to divert the remaining sense from the Universe.
Truth and all that in it is, must be confined in the limits
of the civil life. All actions must bear upon this life,
while, again, it is believed that the boasted inner harmony
of man means that everything bears upon his actions and
they never think that, if it is to be a true and free life, the
existence of an individual in the state, even as of the state
itself, must have arisen from the Whole. But they are
sunk in blind idolatry of the existing civil life, they are
convinced that it affords material enough for the sense and

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 129

displays rich enough pictures. Hence they have a right
to guard against discontented seeking for something else
and departure from the natural centre and axis. All
emotions and endeavours not so directed, are but useless
and exhausting exercises, from which, by purposeful
activity, the soul must as much as possible be restrained.
Pure love to art, or even to nature itself, is for them an
extravagance, only to be endured because it is not quite
so bad as other tendencies, and because many find in it con-
solation and compensation in various ills. Knowledge is
sought with a wise and sober moderation and never with-
out regard to practical life. The smallest thing that has
influence in this sphere is not to be neglected, and the
greatest, just because it goes further, is decried, as if it
were mean and perverted.

That, nevertheless, there are things which, to some little
depth must be explored, is for them a necessary evil, and
that a few are ever to be found who, from unconquerable
liking, undertake it, they thank the gods, and with sacred
pity regard them as willing sacrifices. They most sincerely
lament that there are feelings which cannot be tamed by
the external sway of their formulas and precepts, and that
in this way many men are rendered socially unhappy or
immoral. People for whom the moral. side of civil life is
everything, and whom, though they may step a little
beyond their trade, I reckon also among this class, con-
sider this one of the profoundest evils of human nature, to be
got rid of with all possible speed. The good people believe
that their own activity is everything and exhausts the task
of humanity, and that, if all would do what they do, they
would require no sense for anything except for action.
Wherefore they dock everything with their shears, and
they will not suffer a single characteristic phenomenon that
might awake a religious interest to grow. What can be
seen and understood from their standpoint is all they allow,
and it is merely asmall, barren circle, without science, with-

K

130 THIRD SPEECH.

out morals, without art, without love, without spirit, I might
almost say without letter.” In short, it is without any-
thing whereby the world might disclose itself, and yet
it has many lofty pretensions to the same. They think,
indeed, that they have the true and real world, and that
they are the people who grasp and treat all things in their
true connection.

Would that they could but once see that, for anything to
be known as an element of the Whole, it must necessarily
be contemplated in its characteristic nature and in its fullest
completeness ! In the Universe it can be nothing except
by the totality of its effects and relations. That is the sum
and substance, and, to perceive it, every matter must be
considered, not from some outside point, but from its own
proper centre, which is to say, in its separate existence, its
own proper nature. This is to have all points of view
for everything, and the opposite is to have one point of
view for all, which is the most direct way to leave the
Universe behind, to sink in lamentable narrowness and
become a serf bound to the spot of earth on which we
happen to stand.

4 In the relations of man to this world there are certain

openings into the Infinite, prospects past which all are led
that their sense may find its way to the Whole. Immediate
feelings of definite content may not be produced by this
glimpse, but there may be a general susceptibility to all
religious feelings. Those prospects therefore, are wisely
blocked up, and in the opening some philosophical carica-
ture is placed as an ill-favoured place is at times covered
by some sorry picture.

And if, as happens at times, the omnipotence of the
Universe makes itself manifest in those people of under-
standing themselves, if some ray penetrating falls upon
their eyes and their soul cannot be shielded from some stir-
ring of those emotions, the Infinite is never a goal to which
they fly for rest. It is as a post at the end of a course,

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 131

simply a point to be rounded, without touching, at the
greatest speed, and the sooner they can return to their old
place the better. |

Birth and death are such points. Before them it is im-
possible to forget that our own selfis completely surrounded
by the Infinite. Despite of their frequency, so soon as they
touch us more nearly, they always stir a quiet longing and
a holy reverence. ‘I'he measurelessness of sense perception
is also a hint at least of a still higher infinity. But nothing
would please better those persons of understanding than
to be able to use the greatest radius of the system of the
worlds, as men now use the meridian of the earth, for
measuring and reckoning in common life. And, if the
images of life and death do approach them, believe me,
however much they may speak of religion, it does not lie
so near their hearts as to use the occasion to win some few
young people for caution and economy in the use of their
powers and for the noble art of lengthening life.

Punished they certainly are. They reach no standpoint
from which they might themselves rear, from the founda-
tion, this worldly wisdom in which they trust, but move
slavishly and reverently in ancient forms or divert them-
selves with little improvements. This is the extreme of
utilitarianism to which the age with rapid strides is being
hurried by worthless scholastic word-wisdom. This new
barbarism is a fit counterpart of the old. It is the beau-
tiful fruit of the paternal eudaimonistic politics which has
supplanted rude despotism and permeates all departments of
life. We have all been affected, and the capacity for religion,
not being able to keep pace in its development with other
things, has suffered in the early bud.

These men, the crazy buttresses of a crumbling time,
I distinguish from you, even as you would not have your-
selves made equal with them, for they do not despise
religion, and they are not to be called cultured. But they
destroy religion as much as they can, and they train the age

i K 2

132 THIRD SPEECH.

and enlighten men, even to transparency, if they had their
will. They are still the dominating party, and you and we
are but a very few. Whole towns and countries are
educated on their principles. Those again who have come
through this education, are found in society, in science,
and in philosophy. - Nay, philosophy is their peculiar place
of abode. And now it is not merely ancient philosophy—
using the present highly historical classification into ancient
new and newest—but the new also they have annexed.
By their vast influence on every worldly interest and
the semblance of philanthropy which dazzles the social
inclination, this way of thinking ever holds religion in
subjection, and resists every movement whereby its life
might anywhere reveal itself with full power.
Religion at present can only be advanced by the strongest
| resistance to this general tendency, and it cannot begin
except by radical opposition. As everything follows the
law of affinity, sense can only triumph by taking possession
of an object on which this kind of understanding so hostile
to it, hangs but loosely. This it will acquire most easily
and with superfluity of free power. Now this object is the
inner, not the outer world. The enlightening psychology,
the masterpiece of this kind of understanding, has at length
exhausted itself by extravagance and lost almost all good
name. The calculating understanding has here first va- -
cated the field and left it open once more for pure obser-
vation. A religious man must be reflective, his sense must
be occupied in the contemplation of himself. Being occu-
pied with the profoundest depths, he abandons meanwhile
all external things, intellectual as well as physical, leaving ~
them to be the great aim of the researches of the people of
understanding. In accordance with this law, the feeling —
for the Infinite is most readily developed in persons whose
nature keeps them far from that which is the central point —
ofall the opponents of the universal complete life. Hence |
it comes that, from of old, all truly religious characters

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 133

have had a mystical trait, and that all imaginative natures,
which are too airy to occupy themselves with solid and
rigid worldly affairs, have at least some stirrings of piety.
This is the character of all the religious appearances of our
time ; from those two colours, imagination and mysticism,
though in various proportions, they are all composed.
Appearances I say, because, in this state of things, more is
scarcely to be expected.

Imaginative natures fail in penetrative spirit, in capacity
for mastering the essential. A light changing play of
beautiful, often charming, but merely fortuitous and entirely
subjective combinations, satisfies them and is the highest
they can conceive, and a deeper and inner connection pre-
sents itself in vain. They are really only seeking the
infinity and universality of charming appearances. Accord-
ing as it is viewed this may be less or very much more than
their sense can attain, but to appearance they have accommo-
dated themselves, and instead of a healthy and powerful life,
they have only disconnected and fleeting emotions. The
mind is easily kindled, but it is with a flame as unsteady
' asitis ready. They have emotions of religion just as they
have of art, philosophy and all things great and beautiful
—they are attracted by the surface.

To the very nature of the other class, again, religion
pre-eminently belongs. But their sense always remains
turned towards themselves, for, in the present condition of
the world, they do not know how to attain anything beyond,
and they soon fail in material for cultivating their feeling
to an independent piety. There is a great and powerful
mysticism, not to be considered by the most frivolous man
without reverence and devotion, which, by its heroic
simplicity and proud scorn of the world, wrings admiration
from the most judicious. It does not arise from being sated
and overladen by external influences, but, on every occa-
sion, some secret power ever drives the man back upon
himself, and he finds himself to be the plan and key of the

134 THIRD SPEECH.

Whole. Convinced by a great analogy and a daring faith
that it is not necessary to forsake himself, but that the
spirit has enough in itself to be conscious of all that could
be given from without, by a free resolve, he shuts -his eyes
for ever against all that is not himself. Yet this contempt
is no ignorance, this closing of the sense no incapacity.

Thus, alas! it stands with our party at the present day.
They have not learned to open their souls to Nature. Their
living relation to it suffers from the clamsy way in which
objects are rather indicated than shown, and they have
neither sense nor light remaining from their self-con-
templation sufficient to penetrate this ancient darkness. »
Wherefore, in scorn of this evil age, they would fain have
nothing to do with its work in them. Their higher feeling
is thus untrained and needy, and their true inward fellow-
ship with the world is both confined and sickly. Alone
with their sense, they are compelled to circulate eternally
in an all too narrow sphere, and, after a sickly life, their
religious sense dies, from want of attraction, of indirect
weakness.

Another end awaits those whose sense for the highest
turns boldly outwards, seeking there expansion and renova-
tion for its life. Their disharmony with the age only too
clearly appears, for they suffer a violent death, happy if
you will, yet fearful, the suicide of the spirit. Not knowing
how to comprehend the world, the essence and larger sense
of which remains strange to them among the paltry views
to which an outward constraint limits them, they are
deceived by confused phenomena, abandoned to unbridled
fancies, and seek the Universe and its traces where they
never were. Finally they unwillingly rend asunder utterly
the connection of the inner and the outer, chase the impo-
tent understanding and end in a holy madness, the source
of which almost no man knows. They are loud screaming but
not understood victims of the general contempt and mal-
treatment of the heart of man. Only victims, however, not

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 135

_ heroes, for whosoever succumbs, though it be in the final
test, cannot be reckoned among the recipients of the inmost
mysteries. |
This complaint that there are no permanent, openly recog-

nized representatives of religion among us, is not to recall
my earlier assertions that our ageis not less favourable to
religion than any other. The amount of religion in the
world is not diminished, but it is broken up and driven
apart by an oppressive force. It reveals itself in small and ©
fleeting though frequent manifestations that rather exalt
the variety of the Universe and delight the eye of the
observer, than produce foritself a great and sublime im-
pression. I abide by the conviction that there are many
who breathe out the sweetest fragrance of the young lifein
sacred longing and love to the Eternal and the Changeless,
and who late at least, and perhaps never, are overcome by
the world; that there are none to whom once, at least, the
high World-Spirit has not appeared, casting on them,
while they were ashamed for themselves and blushed at
their unworthy limitation, one of those piercing glances
that the downcast eye feels without seeing. By this I abide,
and the conscience of everyone can judge of it. But heroes
of religion, holy souls, as they have been seen, who are
entirely permeated by religion which is all in all to them,
are wanting and must be wanting to this generation. And
as often as I reflect on what must happen and what direction
our culture must take, if religious men of a higher type are
again to appear as a natural if rare product of their age,
I think that your whole endeavour—whether consciously,
you may yourselves decide—is not a little helpful for a
palingenesis of religion. Partly your general working,
partly the endeavours of a narrower circle, partly the
sublime ideas of a few spirits notable among mankind,
shall serve this purpose.*

_ The strength and compass, as well as the purity and clear-
ness of every perception, depend upon the keenness and

136 THIRD SPEECH.

vigour of the sense. Suppose the wisest man without
opened senses. He would not be nearer religion than the
most thoughtless and wanton who only had an open and
true sense. Here then we must begin. An end must be
made to the slavery in which the sense of man is held, for the
benefit of exercisings of the understanding whereby nothing
is exercised, of those enlightenments that make nothing
clear, of those dissectings whereby nothing is resolved.
This is an end for which you will all labour with united
powers. Ithas happened to the improvements in education
as to all revolutions that have not been begun on the highest
principles: things have gradually glided back into the old

course, and only a few changes in exterhals preserve the .'

memory of what was at first considered a marvellously great
occurrence. Hence our judicious and practical education of
to-day is but little distinguished from the ancient mechanical
article, and that little is neither in spirit nor in working.
This has not escaped you. It begins to be as detestable to
all truly cultured people as it is to me. A juster idea of
the sacredness of childhood and the eternity of inviolable
liberty is spreading. Even in the first stages of develop-
ment, it is seen that the manifestations of liberty must be
expected and inquired for. Soon those barriers shall be
broken down; the intuitive power will take possession of
its whole domain, every organ will be opened, and it will
be possible for objects, in all ways, to affect man.

With this regained liberty of sense, however, a limitation
and firm direction of the activity may very well consist.
This is the great demand from contemporaries and posterity,
with which the best among you are coming forward. You
are tired of seeing barren, encyclopedic versatility. Only -
by this way of self-limitation have you become what you
are, and you know there is no other way to culture. You
insist, therefore, that everyone should seek to become some-
thing definite, and follow something with steadfastness and
concentration. No one can perceive the justice of this

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 137

counsel better than the man who has ripened to a certain
universality of sense, for he must know that, except by
separation and limitation, perception would have no objects.
I rejoice, therefore, at these efforts, and would they had had
more success, Religion would thereby receive excellent
help, for this very limitation of effort, if only the sense
itself is not. limited, all the more surely prepares for the
sense the way to the Infinite and opens again the long
interrupted intercourse. Whosoever has seen and known
much and can then resolve, with his whole might, to do
and forward something for its own sake, must recognize,
if he is not to contradict himself, that other things have
been made and have a right to existence for their own
sakes. And when he has succeeded to the utmost in the
object of his choice, it will least of all escape him at the
summit of perfection that, without all the rest, this is
nothing. This recognition of the strange and annihiiation
of the personal that urge themselves everywhere upon a
thoughtful man, this seasonably changing love and contempt
for all that is finite and limited are not possible without a
dim presentiment of the World and God, and they must call
forth a more definite longing for the One in the All.

Every man knows from his own consciousness three
spheres of the sense in which its different manifestations
are divided. First there is the interior of the Ego itself;
second, the outer world, in so far as it is indefinite and
incomplete—call it mass, matter, element, or what you will ;
the third seems to unite both, the sense turning, in constant
change, within and without, and only finding peace in
perceiving the absolute unity of both sides, which is the
sphere of the individual, of what is complete in itself, of all
that is art in nature, and in the works of man. Everyone
is not equally at home in all those spheres, but from each
there is a way to pious exaltations of the soul which take
characteristic form simply according to the variety of the
ways in which they have been found.

138 THIRD SPEECH.

Study yourselves with unswerving attention, put aside
all that is not self, proceed with the sense ever more
closely directed to the purely inward. The more you pass
by all foreign elements, making your personality appear
diminished almost to the vanishing point, the clearer the
Universe stands before you, and the more gloriously
the terror of annihilating the fleeting is rewarded by the
feeling of the eternal.

Look outside again on one of the widely distributed
elements of the world. Seek to understand it in itself, and
seek it in particular objects, in yourself and everywhere.
Traverse again and again your way from centre to circum-
ference, going ever farther afield. You will rediscover
everything everywhere, and you will only be able to re-
cognize it in relation to its opposite. Soon everything
individual and distinct will have been lost and the Universe
be found.

What way now leads from the third sphere, from the
sense for art ? Its immediate object is by no means the
Universe itself. It is an individual thing complete in
itself and rounded off. There is satisfaction in each enjoy-
ment, and the mind, peacefully sunk in it, is not driven to
such a progress as would make the single thing gradually
disappear and be replaced by the Universe. Is there no-
where any way, but must this sphere for ever remain apart,
and artists be condemned to be irreligious? Or is there
perhaps some other relation between art and religion? I
could wish to leave the question for your own solution, for
to me the inquiry is too difficult and too strange. But you
have used your sense and love for art to good purpose, and
I would willingly leave you to yourselves on your native
soil. One of my thoughts on the matter, however, I would
have not to be wish and presentiment merely but insight
and prophecy. But judge for yourselves. If it is true
that there are sudden conversions whereby in men, thinking
of nothing less than of lifting themselves above the finite,

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 139

in a moment, as by an immediate, inward illumination,
the sense for the highest comes forth and surprises them
by its splendour, I believe that more than anything else
the sight of a great and sublime work of art can accom-
plish this miracle. AndI would believe that, without any
gradual approximation beforehand, you may perhaps be
met by such a beam of your own sun and turned to
religion.

By the first way of finding the Universe, the most ab-
stracted self-contemplation, the most ancient eastern
Mysticism, with marvellous boldness that resembled the
more recent Idealism among us, linked the infinitely great
to the infinitely little and found everything bordering on
nothing.

From the contemplation of the masses and their counter-
parts, again, every religion, the pattern of which is the
heavens or elemental nature, has manifestly proceeded.
The polytheistic Egypt was long the most perfect nurse of
this type of thought. In it we can at least guess that the
purest intuition of the original and real may have walked
in meek tolerance close beside the darkest superstitions and
the most senseless mythology.”

And if there is nothing to tell of a religion originating
in art that has ruled peoples and times, it is all the clearer
that the sense for art has never approached those two kinds
of religion without covering them with new beauty and
holiness and sweetly mitigating their original narrowness.
Thus the ancient sages and poets, and above all, the artists
of the Greeks, changed the natural religion into fairer,
more gladsome form. In all the mythical representations
of the divine Plato and his followers, which you would ac-
knowledge rather as religious than as scientific, we perceive
how beautifully that mystical self-contemplation mounts to
the highest pinnacle of divineness and humanness. Simply
by the ordinary life in the sphere of art and by a living
endeavour, sustained by indwelling power and especially by

140 THIRD SPEECH.

poetic art, he penetrates from one form of religion to the
opposite and unites both. One can only marvel, therefore,
at the beautiful self-forgetfulness with which in holy zeal,
as a just king that does not spare even his too soft-hearted
mother, he speaks against art, for, where there was no cor-
ruption and no misunderstanding produced by corruption,
the work of art was but a free-will service rendered to the
imperfect natural religions.

At present art serves no religion, and all is different and
worse. Religion and art stand together like kindred
beings, whose inner affinity, though mutually unrecognized
and unsuspected, appears in various ways.® Like the
opposite poles of two magnets, being mutually attracted,
they are violently agitated but cannot overcome their
gravity soas to touch and unite. Friendly words and out-
pourings of the heart are ever on their lips, but they are
always held back, as they cannot find again the right
manner and the last reason of their thinking and longing.
They await a fuller revelation and, suffering and sighing
under the same load, they see each other enduring, with
‘ heartfelt liking and deep feeling perhaps, but without the
love that truly unites. Will this common burden bring
about the happy moment of their union, or from pure love
and joy is there to be as you desire a new day for art alone?
However it comes, whichever is first set free will certainly
hasten, with at least a sister’s faithfulness, to aid the other.

But religion of both types not only is without the aid
of art, but is, in its own state, worse than of old. The
two sources of perception and feeling of the Infinite
streamed forth magnificently upon an age when scientific
subtilties, without true principles, had not yet corrupted by
their commonness the purity of the sense, even though
neither may have been rich enough to produce the highest.
At present, they are troubled by the loss of simplicity and
the ruinous influence of a conceited and false insight. How
are they to be purified ? Whence are they to have power

THE CULTIVATION OF RELIGION. 141

and fulness for enriching the soil with more than ephemeral
products ? To unite their waters in one channel, is the
sole means for bringing religion to completion by the way
we are now going. That would be an event, from the
bosom of which, in a new and glorious form, religion would
soon go to meet better times.

See then, whether you wish it or not, the goal of your
highest endeavours is just the resurrection of religion.
By your endeavours this event must be brought to pass,
and I celebrate you as, however unintentionally, the
rescuers and cherishers of religion. Do not abandon your
post and your work till you have unlocked the recesses of
knowledge, and, in priestlike humility, have opened the
sanctuary of true science. Then all who draw nigh, and
the sons of religion among them, will be compensated for
what half knowledge and arrogance have made them lose,

Philosophy, exalting man to the consciousness of his
reciprocity with the world, teaching him to know himself,
not as a separate individual, but as a living, operative
member of the Whole, will no longer endure to see the man
who steadfastly turns his eye to his own spirit in search of
the Universe, pine in poverty and need. The anxious wall
of separation is broken down. The outer world is only
another inner world. Everything is the reflection of his
own spirit, as his spirit isthe copy of all things. He can
seek himself in this reflection without losing himself or
going outside of himself. He can never exhaust himself in
contemplation of himself, for in himself everything lies.

Ethics, in its chaste and heavenly beauty, far from
jealousy and despotic pride, will hand him at the entrance
the heavenly lyre and the magic glass, that he may see in
countless forms the earnest quiet image of the spirit ever
the same and may accompany it with divine music.

Natural science sets the man who looks around him to
discover the Universe, in the centre of nature, and no
longer suffers him to dissipate himself fruitlessly in the

142 THIRD SPEECH.

study of small details. He can now pursue the play of
nature’s powers into their most secret recesses, from the
inaccessible storehouses of energized matter to the artistic
workshops of the organic life. He measures its might from |
the bounds of world-filled space to the centre of his own
Ego, and finds himself everywhere in eternal strife and
in closest union. He is nature’s centre and circumference.
Delusion is gone and reality won. Sure is his glance and
clear is his view. Under all disguises he detects it and
nowhere rests except in the Infinite and the One. Already
I see some distinguished forms return from the sanctuary
after initiation into those mysteries, who, having purified
and adorned themselves, will come forth in priestly robes.

Can one goddess, then, still linger with her helpful
presence? For. this, also, time will make us great and rich
amends. The greatest work of art has for its material
humanity itself, and the Deity directly fashions it. For
this work the sense must soon awake in many, for at
present, He is working with bold and effective art. And
you will be the temple servants when the new forms are set
up in the temple of time. Expound the Artist then with
force and spirit; explain the earlier works from the later
and the later from the earlier. Let the past, the present,
and the future surround us with an endless gallery of the
sublimest works of art, eternally multiplied by a thousand -
brilliant mirrors. Let the history of the worlds be ready
with rich gratitude to reward religion its first nurse, by
awaking true and holy worshippers for eternal might and
wisdom. See how, without your aid, the heavenly growth
flourishes in the midst of your plantings. It is a witness of
the approval of the gods and of the imperishableness of
your desert. Neither disturb it nor pluck it up; it is an
ornament that adorns, a talisman that protects.

EXPLANATIONS OF THE THIRD SPEECH.

(1) Page 123.—This expression appears to contradict the words of
Christ which He spoke to His disciples, “ Ye have not chosen me, but I
have chosen you.” Yet thecontradictionis only apparent, foronanother —
occasion He asked of His disciples whether they also were deceived as
others had been, whereby He acknowledged that their continuance
with Him was a free act. Now this is all that is here asserted. In
their declaration of steadfastness, we can say, that they chose Him
anew as their Master, with a quicker sense and a riper judgment.
Also it would be wrong to interpret Christ’s words as if they had only
special reference to certain persons. This would be a particular sense
which I would not defend. It was not by an original divine impulse
common to Him and to them, that the kingdom of God was founded.
Of subordinate movements in religion, such as reform of the church,
this may very well be said, but it was not thus that Peter, as their
representative, recognized Him as the profoundest and mightiest.
Originally, the emotion was in Him alone; in them there was only
the capacity for having it awakened. What is here said, therefore,
entirely agrees with the representation of Christ ; indeed, his relation
to His disciples suggested it. Had not Christ set out from the view
that every living utterance, however individual, can only awake its
response in another in a universal way and that complete attachment
to the individuality of another is always a free act, He could not
have set His disciples on such a footing of equality as to call them
brethren and friends.

(2) Page 124.—What is here said follows naturally from the passage
just explained. The best example is found in the oldest Christian
history, in the Proselytes from Heathenism, who forsook the Jews who
first woke in them the sense of the one Highest Being and went over to
Christianity. In every time when the religious life is stirred, as un-
questionably it has begun to be among us since this was written, it
seems to me specially necessary that all who, either from profession

144 THIRD SPEECH.

or from inward call, exercise a marked religious influence, should rise
to this freer view, that they may not wonder why so many who have
received their first impulse from them, should only find their complete
rest in very different views and sentiments. Let everyone rejoice at
waking life, for he thereby approves himself an instrument of the
Divine Spirit, but let none believe that the fashioning of it continues
in his power. |
(3) Page 130.—Only by this last trait is the picture of the way of
thinking here described made complete, forthese men flee also theletter.
As they admit a moral, political or religious confession only, in so far
as everyone can still think what he will, so no practical rules are
valid except with the proviso of standing exceptions, that everything
following the principle of absolute utility, should stand completely
alone, as nothing through nothing for nothing. Some reader of
another stamp may look askance, however, on an expression that
ascribes a worth, and indeed no small worth, to the letter, for I
make it equal with the other qualities here named, and misunderstand-
ings, specially struggled against at the present day are thus favoured.
I would warn him that such a conscious depreciation of what has
been set too high does not serve truth, but in part produces obstinacy
and in part it favours reaction. Therefore, we would at all times
ascribe a high degree of worth to the letter in all earnest things, in
so far as it is not separate from the spirit and dead. The imme-
diate life in the great unities is too closely shut to be entered by the
letter, for what letter could comprehend, say, the existence of a
people? and in the individual there are elements too fleeting to be
embraced in it, for what letter could express the nature of a single
individual? But the letter is the indispensable selecting discretion,
without which we could only vibrate giddily between the individual and
the great classes. By it the chaotic indeterminate crowd is changed
into the determinate multitude. Nay, in the largest sense the ages
are distinguished by the letter, and it is the master-piece of the
highest wisdom to estimate rightly when human things require a new
letter. Does it appear too early the love for what itis to supplant
rejects it? is it too late, that giddiness has already begun which it
‘can no more exorcise P
(4) Page 135.—No one will suppose that I regard the manifestations
of an awakened religious life so frequent, especially in Germany at the
present time, as the fulfilment of the hope here uttered. That I do
not regard it in this way, appears clearly enough from what follows,
for a piety revived by greater openness of sense would be of a differ-
ent type from what we see among us. The impatient uncharitable-

EXPLANATIONS. 145

ness of our new Pietists that is not content to withdraw from what it
dislikes, but uses every social relation for defamation to the danger
ot all free spiritual life; their painful listening for special expres-
sions, in accordance with which they make one man white and another
black ; the indifference of most of them to all great historical events ;

_ the aristocratic narrow-mindedness of others; the general dislike of

all science are not signs of an open sense. Rather they are signs of
a deep-rooted, morbid state which must be treated with love and also
with great firmness, if there is not to be more loss to society in
general than gain to individuals. We will not deny that many of
the lower class can only be awaked from their stupidity, and of the
higher from their worldliness, by this acerb kind of piety, yet we
would wish and earnestly labour that this stage should be for most
but a transition toa worthier freedom of the spiritual life. This
should the more easily be accomplished as it is: patent enough how
easily men who are concerned with something quite different from
true piety, master this form, and how visibly the spirit decays that
is long shut up in it.

(5) Page 139.—In the “ Glaubenslehre ” religion is divided as pre-
dominantly active or passive, as concerned with the problem of duty, or
absolutely dependent on the Whole, as teleological or zesthetical. With
this division the forms of religion here mentioned would not seem
to agree, for the most abstracted self-contemplation, or the most
objective contemplation of the world may be either active or passive.
But I am not seeking to distinguish here the chief forms of religion,
I am treating of cultivation of religion by opening of the sense. By
this cultivation individuals are not introduced into a definite form of
religion, but everyone is rendered capable of discerning the form that
best suits him and of determining himself accordingly. Being more
concerned to show the chief aspects of sense, I naturally make most
prominent those forms in which one or other is most conspicuous.
Yet even here it is not meant that subjective reflection has not to
do with the objectively observing Ego, or objective observation with
a world that awakes and sustains the spiritual life. Hence it would
be vain to expect that Christianity be here assigned its place as in
the “ Glaubenslehre ” it is placed under the ethical or teleological.
Even in the Speech itself, it is hinted that that historical sense
which is the completest union of both directions leads most perfectly
to piety. That this sense lies quite specially at the foundation of
Christianity, in which everything comes back to the relation of man
to the Kingdom of God, requires no proof. It therefore naturally
follows that Christianity presents a piety nourished as much by con-

L

146 THIRD SPEECH.

templation of the world, as by self-contemplation, and is best
nourished when both are most joined. Of course these are subordi-
nate distinctions of receptivity and are naturally quite subjective and
incapable of determining the different forms of Christianity.

(6) Page 140.—This affinity will hardly be denied now by anyone.
Nothing but attention to the subject is required to find that, on the
one hand, in allarts, all great works are religious representations, and
that on the other, in all religions, Christianity not excepted, hostility
to art involves barrenness and coldness. In allarts there is a severer;
more sustained style and a freer and easier. Religious art mostly
upholds the severer style. When religious objects are handled in
the light style, the decay of religion is decided and the decay of art
quickly follows. The lighter style only maintains its true character
as art so long as it finds its mass and harmony in the severer. The
more it renounces its connection with the severer style, and there-
fore with religion, the more certainly and irresistibly it degenerates
into over refinement and the art of flattery. Already this has been
often repeated in the history of the arts, and in individuals it is
being repeated at the present day.

FOURTH SPEECH.
ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION, OR CHURCH AND PRIESTHOOD.

THoss of you who are accustomed to regard religion simply
as a malady of the soul, usually cherish the idea that if
the evil is not to be quite subdued, it is at least more
endurable, so long as it only infects individuals here and
there. On the other hand, the common danger is increased
and everything put in jeopardy by too close association
among the patients. So long as they are isolated, judicious
treatment, due precautions against infection and a healthy
spiritual atmosphere may allay the paroxysms and weaken,
if they do not destroy, the virus, but in the other case the
only remedy to be relied onis the curative influence of
nature. The evil would be accompanied by the most
dangerous symptoms and be far more deadly being nursed
and heightened by the proximity of the infected. Even a
few would then poison the whole atmosphere ; the soundest
bodies would be infected ; all the canals in which the processes
of life are carried on would be destroyed; all juices would
be decomposed; and, after undergoing such a feverish
delirium, the healthy spiritual life and working of whole
generations and peoples would be irrecoverably ruined.
Hence your opposition to the church, to every institution
meant for the communication of religion is always more
violent than your opposition to religion itself, and priests,
as the supports and specially active members of such insti-
tutions are for you the most hated among men.
L 2

148 FOURTA SPEECH.

But those of you who have a somewhat milder view of
religion, regarding it rather as an absurdity than as an
absolute distraction, have an equally unfavourable idea of
all organizations for fellowship. Slavish surrender of every-
thing characteristic and free, spiritless mechanism and vain
usages are, you consider, the inseparable consequences of
every such institution. It is the skilful work of persons
who with incredible success make great gain from things
that are nothing, or which at least every other person could
have done equally well.

Were it not that I strive to bring you in this matter to
the right standpoint, I would very unwillingly expose my
heart to you on such a weighty matter. How many of the
perverse efforts and the sad destinies of mankind you
ascribe to religion, I do not need to recount. In a thousand
utterances of the most esteemed among you it is clear as
day. And I will not pause to refute those charges in
detail and derive them from other causes. Rather let us
subject the whole idea of the church to a new consideration,
reconstructing it from the centre outwards, unconcerned
about how much is fact and experience.

If there is religion at all, it must be social, for that is the
nature of man, and it is quite peculiarly the nature of
religion. You must confess that when an individual has
produced and wrought out something in his own mind, it is
morbid and in the highest degree unnatural to wish to
reserve it to himself. He should express it in the indis-
pensable fellowship and mutual dependence of action. And
there is also a spiritual nature which he has in common
with the rest of his species which demands that he express
and communicate all that isin him. The more violently he
is moved and the more deeply he is impressed, the stronger
that social impulse works. And this is true even if we
regard it only as the endeavour to find the feeling in
others, and so to besure that nothing has been encountered
that is not human.

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 149

. You see that this is not a case of endeavouring to make
others like ourselves, nor of believing that what is in one
man is indispensable for all. Itis only the endeavour to
become conscious of and to exhibit the true relation of our
own life to the common nature of man.

But indisputably the proper subjects for this impulse to
communicate are the conscious states and feelings in which
originally man feels himself passive. He is urged on to
learn whether it may not be an alien and unworthy power that
has produced them. Those are the things which mankind
from childhood are chiefly engaged in communicating.
His ideas, about the origin of which he can have no doubts,
he would rather leave in quiet. Still more easily he resolves
to reserve his judgments. But of all that enters by the
senses and stirs the feelings he will have witnesses and
participators. How could he keep to himself the most
comprehensive and general influences of the world when
they appear to him the greatest and mostirresistible? How
should he wish to reserve what most strongly drives him
out of himself and makes him conscious that he cannot
know himself from himself alone? If a religious view
become clear to him, or a pious feeling stir his soul, it is
rather his first endeavour to direct others to the same
subject andif possible transmit the impulse.

The same nature that makes it necessary for the pious
person to speak, provides him also with an audience. No
element of life, so much as religion, has implanted along
with it so vivid a feeling of man’s utter incapacity ever
to exhaust it for himself alone. No sooner has he any
sense for it than he feels its infinity and his own limits.
He is conscious that he grasps but a small part of it,
and what he cannot himself reach he will, at least, so far
as he is able, know and enjoy from the representations of
those who have obtained it. This urges him to give his
religion full expression, and, seeking his own perfection, to
listen to every note that he can recognize as religious.

150 FOURTH SPEECH.

Thus mutual communication organizes itself, and speech
and hearing are to all alike indispensable.

But the communication of religion is not like the com-
munication of ideas and perceptions to be sought in books."
In this medium, too much of the pure impression of the
original production is lost. Like dark stuffs that absorb
the greater part of the rays of light, so everything of the
pious emotion that the inadequate signs do not embrace
and give out again, is swallowed up. Inthe written com-
munication of piety, everything needs to be twice or thrice
repeated, the original medium requiring to be again ex-
hibited, and still its effect on men in general in their great
unity can only be badly copied by multiplied reflection.
Only when it is chased from the society of the living,
religion must hide its varied life in the dead letter.

Nor can this intercourse with the heart of man be carried
on in common conversation. Many who have a regard for
religion have upbraided our times, because our manners
are such that in conversation in society and in friendly
intercourse, we talk of all weighty subjects except of God
and divine things. In our defence I would say, this is
neither contempt nor indifference, but a very correct
instinct. Where mirth and laughing dwell, and even
earnestness must pliantly associate with joke and witticism,
there can be no room for what must ever be attended by
holy reserve and awe. Religious views, pious feelings, and
earnest reflections, are not to be tossed from one to another
in such small morsels as the materials of a light conver-
sation. On sacred subjects it would be rather sacrilegious
than fitting to be ready with an answer to every question
and a response to every address.? Religion, therefore,
withdraws itself from too wide circles to the more familiar
conversation of friendship or the dialogue of love, where
glance and action are clearer than words, and where a
solemn silence also is understood.

By way of the light and rapid exchange of retorts

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. ISI

common in society divine things cannot be treated, but
there must be a higher style and another kind of society
entirely consecrated to religion. On the highest subject
with which language has to deal, it is fitting that the ful-
ness and splendour of human speech be expended. It is
not as if there were any ornament that religion could not do
without, but it would be impious and frivolous of its heralds,
if they would not consecrate everything to it, if they would
not collect all they possess that is glorious, that religion
may, if possible, be presented in all power and dignity.
Without poetic skill, therefore, religion can only be ex-
pressed and communicated rhetorically, in all power and
skill of speech,’ and in its swiftness and inconstancy the
service of every art that could aid, is willingly accepted.
Hence a person whose heart is full of religion, only opens
his mouth before an assembly where speech so richly
equipped might have manifold working.

Would that I could depict to you the rich, the super-
abundant life in this city of God, when the citizens assemble,
each full of native force seeking liberty of utterance and full
at the same time of holy desire to apprehend and appro-
priate what others offer. When one stands out before the
others he is neither justified by office nor by compact; nor
is it pride or ignorance that inspires him with assurance.
It is the free impulse of his spirit, the feeling of heart-felt
unanimity and completest equality, the common abolition of
all first and last, of all earthly order.* He comes forward
to present to the sympathetic contemplation of others his
own heart as stirred by God, and, by leading them into
the region of religion where he is at home, he would infect
them with his own feeling. He utters divine things and
in solemn silence the congregation follow his inspired
speech. If he unveils a hidden wonder, or links with pro-
phetic assurance the future to the present, or by new
examples confirms old truths, or if his fiery imagination
enchants him in visions into another part of the world

152 FOURTH SPEECH.

and into another order of things, the trained sense of the
congregation accompanies him throughout. On returning
from his wanderings through the Kingdom of God into
himself, his heart and the hearts of all are but the common
seat of the same feeling. Let this harmony of view
announce itself, however softly, then there are sacred
mysteries discovered and solemnized that are not mere
insignificant emblems, but, rightly considered, are natural
indications of a certain kind of consciousness and certain
feelings. It is like a loftier choir that in its own noble tone
answers the voice that calls. ‘

And this is not a mere simile, but, as such a speech is
music without song or melody, there may be a music
among the saints that is speech without words, giving most
definite and comprehensible expression to the heart.

The muse of harmony, the intimate relation of which to
religion has been long known, though acknowledged by
few, has from of old laid on the altars of religion the most
gorgeous and perfect works of her most devoted scholars.
In sacred hymns and choruses to which the words of the
poet are but loosely and airily appended, there are breathed
out things that definite speech cannot grasp. The
melodies of thought and feeling interchange and give
mutual support, till all is satiated and full of the sacred and
the infinite.

Of such a nature is the influence of religious men upon
each other. ‘Thus their natural and eternal union is pro-
duced. It is a heavenly bond, the most perfect production
of the spiritual nature of man, not to be attained till man,
in the highest sense, knows himself. Do not blame them if
they value it more highly than the civil union which you
place so far above all else, but which nevertheless will not
ripen to manly beauty. Compared with that other union, it
appears far more forced than free, far more transient than
eternal.

But where, in all that I have said of the congregation of

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 153

the pious, is that distinction between priests and laity to which
you are accustomed to point as the source of so many evils?
You have been deluded ; this is no distinction of persons,
but only of office and function. Every man is a priest, in
so far as he draws others to himself in the field he has
made his own and can show himself master in; every man
is a layman, in so far as he follows the skill and direction
of another in the religious matters with which he is less
familiar. That tyrannical aristocracy which you describe
as so hateful does not exist, but this society is a priestly
nation,’ a complete republic, where each in turn is leader
and people, following in others the same power that he
feels in himself and uses for governing others.

How then can this be the home of the envy and strife
that you consider the natural consequences of all religious
associations? I see nothing but unity and, just by means of
the social union of the pious, the gentle mingling of all the
differences found in religion. I have called your attention
to two different types of mind and two different directions
in which specially the soul seeks its highest object. Do
yon mean that from them sects must of necessity arise, and
unconstrained fellowship in religion be hindered? In con-
templation, where there is severance because we compre-
hend only in sections, there must be opposition and
contradiction, but reflect that life is quite different. In
it opposites seek each other and all that is separated in
contemplation is mingled. Doubtless persons who most
resemble will most strongly attract each other, but they
cannot on that account make up a whole by themselves,
for there are all degrees of affinity, and with so many
transitions there can be no absolute repulsion, no entire
separation, even between the remotest elements.

Take any body that by characteristic power has its own
organic structure. Unless you forcibly isolate it by some
mechanical means, it will not be homogeneous and distinct,®
but it will show at the extremities transition to the qualities

154 FOURTH SPEECH.

of another body. Pious persons at the lower stage have a
closer union, yet there are always some among them who
have a guess of something higher, who, even better than they
understand themselves, will be understood by a person
belonging to amore advanced society. There is thus a
point of union, though it may yet be hidden from them.
Again, if persons in whom the one type of mind is dominant,
draw together, there will be some among them who at least
understand the two types and, belonging in a certain sense
to both, are connecting links between two otherwise divided
spheres. Thus a person better fitted to put himself in
religious communion with nature is not, in the essentials
of religion, opposed to a person who rather finds the traces
of the Deity in history, and there will never be a dearth of
those who walk with equal ease on both ways. And if
you divide the great domain of religion otherwise, you will
still return to the same point. If unconstrained univer-
sality of the sense is the first and original condition of
religion, and also, as is natural, its ripest fruit, you can
surely see that, as religion advances and piety is purified,
the whole religious world must appear as an indivisible
whole.

The impulse to abstract, in so far as it proceeds to rigid
separation, is a proof of imperfection. The highest and
most cultured always see a universal union, and, in seeing
it, establish it. Every man is only in contact with his
neighbour; but on every side and in every direction he
has neighbours and is thus inseparably bound up with the
whole. Mystics and physicists in religion ; those to whom
the Deity is personal and those to whom Heis not ; those who
have risen toa systematic view of the Universe, or those who
only see it in its elements or as dim chaos should all be
united. A band encloses them all and they cannot be quite
separated, except forcibly and arbitrarily. Each separate
association is a mobile, integrate part of the whole, losing
itself in vague outlines in the whole, and it must ever be

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 155

the better class of members who feel this truth. Whence
then, if not from pure misunderstanding, is the wild mania
for converting to single definite forms of religion that you
denounce, and the awful watchword, “ No salvation save with
us”?!

The society of the pious, as I have exhibited it and as
from its nature it must be, is occupied purely with mutual
communication, and subsists only among persons already
having religion of somekind. How can it be their business
to change the minds of those who already profess to have a
definite religion, or to introduce and initiate persons who
have none at all? The religion of this society as such is
simply the collective religion of all the pious. As each one
sees it in others it is infinite, and no single person can fully
grasp it, for it is in no one instance a unity, not even when
highest and most cultivated. Ifa man, therefore, has any
share in religion, it matters not what, would it not be a
mad proceeding for the society to rend from him that
which suits his nature, for this element also it should
embrace and therefore someone must possess it? And
how would they cultivate persons to whom religion
generally is still strange? Their heritage, the infinite
Whole they cannot communicate to them, and any parti-
cular communication must proceed from an individual and
not the society. Is there something general, indefinite,
something common to all the members that a non-religious
person might receive? But you know that nothing in a
general and indefinite form can actually be communicated.
It must be individual and thoroughly definite, or it is
nothing. This undertaking would have no measure and no
rule. Besides, how would the society ever think of going
beyond itself, seeing the need which gave it birth, the
principle of religious association, has no such bearing ?
Individuals join and become a whole ; the whole being satis-
fied with itself, abides in itself, and has no further endeavour.

Religious effort of this kind, therefore, is never more

156 FOURTH SPEECH.

than a private business of individuals, and is, if I might so
say, rather in so far asa man is outside the church than
as he is within. When, impelled by sacred feelings, he
must withdraw from the circle of religious association where
the common existence and life in God affords the noblest
enjoyment, into the lower regions of life, he can still bring
all that there occupies him into relation with what to his
spirit must ever remain the highest.” On descending among
persons limited to one earthly aim and effort, he is apt to
believe—and let it be forgiven him—that, from intercourse
with gods and muses, he has been transported among a
race of rude barbarians. He feels himself a steward of
religion among unbelievers, a missionary among savages.
As an Orpheus or Amphion he hopes to win many by
heavenly melody. He presents himself among them as a
priestly figure, expressing clearly and vividly his higher
sense in all his doings and in his wholenature. And if there
be any response, how willingly he nurses those first pre-
sentiments of religion in a new soul, believing it to bea
beautiful pledge of its growth, even under an alien and
inclement sky, and how triumphantly he conducts the
novice to the exalted assembly! This activity for the
extension of religion is only the pious longing of the
stranger for his home, the endeavour to carry his Father-
land with him, and find again everywhere its laws and
customs which are his higher, more beauteous life. The
Fatherland itself, blessed and complete in itself, knows
no such endeavour.

After all this, you will possibly say that I seem to be
quite at one with you. I have shown what the church
ought to be. Now, by not ascribing to the ideal church
any of the qualities which distinguish the real, I have, almost
as strongly as you, condemned its present form. I assure
you, however, I have not spoken of what should be, but of
what is,’ unless, indeed, you deny the existence of what is
only hindered by the limits of space from appearing to the

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 157

coarser vision. The true church has, in fact, always been
thus, and still is, and if you cannot see it, the blame is your
own, and lies in a tolerably palpable misunderstanding.
Remember only—to use an old but weighty expression—
that I have not spoken of the church militant, but of the
church triumphant, not of the church that fights against
what the age and the state of man place in its way,
but of the church that has vanquished all opposition, whose
‘ training is complete. I have exhibited a society of men
who have reached consciousness with their piety, and in
whom the religious view of life is dominant. As I trust I
have convinced you that they must be men of some culture
and much power, and that there can never be but very few
of them, you need not seek their union where many hun-
dreds, whose song strikes the ear from afar, are assembled
in great temples. So close together, you well know, men
of this kind do not stand. Possibly anything of the sort
collected in one place is only to be found in single,
separate communities, excluded from the great church. This
at least is certain, that all truly religious men, as many as
there have ever been, have not only had a belief, or rather
a living feeling of such a union, but have actually lived in
it, and, at the same time, they have all known how to
estimate the church, commonly so-called, at about its true
value, which is to say, not particularly high.

The great association to which your strictures properly
apply, is very far from being a society of religious men.
It is only an association of persons who are but seeking
religion, and it seems to me natural that, in almost every
respect, it should be the counterpart of the true church.*®
To make this as clear to you as it is to myself, I must,
alas! condescend upon a mass of earthly and worldly
things, and wind my way through a labyrinth of marvellous
confusions. It is not done without repugnance, but it is
necessary, if you are to agree with me. Perhaps if I draw
your attention to the different forms of religious association

|

158 FOURTH SPEECH.

in the visible and in the true church, you will be convinced
of my opinion in essentials. After what has been said, you
will, I hope, agree that in the true religious society all
communication is mutual. The principle that urges us, to
give utterance to our own experience, is closely connected
with what draws us to that which is strange, and thus
action and reaction are indivisibly united. Here, on the
contrary, it is quite different. All wish to receive, and
there is only one who ought to give. In entire passivity,
they simply suffer the impressions on their organs. So
far as they have power over themselves, they may aid in
receiving, but of reaction on others they do not so much as
think.’ Does that not show clearly enough the difference
in the principles of association? They cannot be spoken
of as wishing to complete their religion through others, for
if they had any religion of their own, it would, from the
necessity of its nature, show itself in some way operative
on others. They exercise no reaction because they are
capable of none; and they can only be incapable because
they have no religion. Were I to use a figure from science
—from which, in matters of religion, I most willingly
borrow expressions—I would say that they are negatively
religious, and press in great crowds to the few points
where they suspect the positive principle of religion.
Having been charged, however, they again fail in capacity
- to retain. The emotion which could but play around the
surface very soon disappears. Then they go about in a
certain feeling of emptiness, till longing awakes once more,
and they gradually become again negatively electrified. —
In few words, this is the history of their religious life
and the character of the social inclination that runs
through it. Not religion, but a little sense for it, and a
painful, lamentably fruitless endeavour to reach it, are all
that can be ascribed even to the best of them, even to those
who show both spirit and zeal. In the course of their
domestic and civil life, and on the larger scene of which

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 159

they are spectators, there is much to stir persons with even a
small share of religious sense. But those emotions remain
only a dim presentiment, a weak impression on a soft mass,
the outlines of which at once become vague. Soon every-
thing is swept away by the waves of the active life, and is
left stranded in the most unfrequented region of the memory,
where it will soon be entirely overlaid by worldly things.

From frequent repetition, however, of this little shock,
a necessity at length arises. The dim something in the
mind, always recurring, must finally be made clear. The
best means, one would think, would be to take time to
observe leisurely and attentively the cause. But it is not a
single thing which they might abstract from all else, that
works on them. It is all human things, and among them
the different relations of their life in other departments.
Then, from old habit, their sense will spontaneously turn
to those relations and once more the sublime and infinite
will, in their eyes, be broken up into single, miserable
details. Feeling this, they do not trust themselves, but
- seek outside help. They would behold in the mirror of
another person’s representation that which in direct per-
ception would soon dissolve.

In this way they seek to reach some higher, more defined
consciousness, yet at the end they misunderstand this whole
endeavour. If the utterances of a truly religious man awake
all those memories, if they have received the combined
impression of them, and go away deeply moved, they
believe that their need is stilled, that the leading of
their nature has been satisfied, and that they have in them
the power and essence of all those feelings. Yet they have
now as formerly, though it may be in a higher degree, but
a fleeting, extraneous manifestation. Being without know-
ledge or guess of true religion, they remain subject to this
delusion, and in the vain hope of at length attaining, they
repeat a thousand times the same endeavour, and yet remain
where and what they were."

160 FOURTH SPEECH.

If they advanced, and a spontaneous and living religion
were implanted in them, they would soon not wish any
more to be among those whose one-sidedness and passivity
would no longer accord with their own state. They would
at least seek beside them another sphere, where piety could
show itself to others both living and life-giving, and soon
they would wish to live altogether in it and devote to it
their exclusive love. Thus in point of fact the church, as
it exists among us, becomes of less consequence to men
the more they increase in religion, and the most pious sever
themselves coldly and proudly. Hardly anything could be
clearer than that man is in this association merely because
he is but seeking to be religious, and continues in it only
so long as he has not yet attained.”

But this proceeds from the way in which the members of
the church deal with religion, for suppose it were possible
to think of a one-sided communication and a state of willing
passivity and abnegation in truly religious men, there could
not possibly bein their combined action the utter perversity
and ignorance you find in the visible church. If the members
of the church had any understanding of religion, the chief
matter for them would be that the person whom they have
made the organ of religion communicate his clearest, most
characteristic views and feelings. But that is what they
would not have, and they rather set limits on all sides to
the utterances of individuality. They desire that he
expound to them chiefly ideas, opinions, dogmas, in short,
not the characteristic elements of religion, but the current
reflections about them. Had they any understanding of
religion, they would know from their own feeling that
those matters of creeds, though, as I said, essential to true
religious union, can by their nature be nothing but signs
that the previously attained results agree, signs of the
return from the most personal impressiveness to the com-
mon centre, the full-voiced refrain after everything has
been uttered with purely individual skill. But of this they

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 161

know nothing. Those matters for them exist for them-
selves and dominate special times.”

The conclusion is, that their united action has nothing of
the character of the higher and freer inspiration that is
proper to religion, but has a school-mastering, mechanical
nature, which indicates that they merely seek to import
religion from without. This they attempt by every means.
To that end they are so attached to dead notions, to the
results of reflection about religion, and drink them in
greedily, that the process that gave them birth may be re-
versed, and that the ideas may change again to the living
emotions and feelings from which they were originally
deduced. Thus they employ creeds which are naturally
last in religious communication, to stimulate what should
properly precede them.

In comparison with the more glorious association which,
in my view, is the only true church, I have spoken of this
larger and widely extended association very disparagingly,
as of something common and mean. This follows from the
nature of the case, and I could-not conceal my mind on the
subject. I guard myself, however, most solemnly against
any assumption you may cherish, that I agree with the
growing wish that this institution should be utterly de-
stroyed. Though the true church is always to stand open
only to those who already have ripened to a piety of their
own, there must be some bond of union with those who
are still seeking. As that is what this institution should
be, it ought, from the nature of the case, to take its leaders
and priests always from the true church.“ Or is religion
to be the single human concern in which there are to be no
institutions for scholars and beginners?

But indeed the whole pattern of this institution must be
different, and its relation to the true church must take an
entirely different aspect. On this matter I may not be
silent. Those wishes and views of mine are too closely
connected with the nature of religious association, and the

M

162 FOURTH SPEECH.

better state of things that I imagine, conduces too much
to its glorification for me to reserve my notions. By the
clear-cut distinction we have established, this at least has
been gained, that we can reflect very calmly on all the
abuses that prevail in the ecclesiastical society. You must
admit that religion, not having produced such a church and
not exhibiting itself in such a church, must be acquitted of
every ill it may have wrought and of all participation in
its evil state. So entirely should it be acquitted that the
reproach that it might degenerate into it, should not once
be made, seeing it cannot possibly degenerate where it has
never been. |

I grant that in this society a disastrous sectarian spirit
exists and must exist. Where religious opinions are used
as methods for attaining religion, they must, seeing a
method requires to be thoroughly definite and finished, be
formed into a definite whole.“ And where they are some-
thing that can only be given from without, being accepted
on the authority of the giver, everyone whose religious
speech is of a different cast, must be regarded as a dis-
turber of quiet and sure progress, for by his very existence
and the claims involved, he weakens this authority. Nay,
I even grant that in the old Polytheism, where naturally
religion could not be summed up as one, but willingly sub-
mitted to all division and severance, this sectarian spirit
was much milder and more peaceable, and that in the other-
wise better times of systematic religion it first organized
itself and displayed its full power. Where all believe they
have a complete system with a centre, the value of details
must be vastly greater.

I grant both; but you will admit that there is no reproach
to religion in general, and there is no proof that the view
of the Universe as system is not the highest stage of
religion. I grant thatin this society there is more regard
to understanding and believing, to acting and to perfect-

ing customs than is favourable to a free development of

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 163

religious perceptions and feelings, and that in consequence,
however enlightened its teaching be, it borders on some
superstition and depends on some mythology; but you
will admit, that, in that degree, its whole nature is distant
from true religion, I grant that this association can hardly
exist without a standing distinction between priests and
laity as two different religious orders. Whosoever has
cultivated in himself his feeling to dexterity in some kind
of presentation, characteristically and completely, cannot
possibly continue a layman, or conduct himself as if all
this were wanting. He would be free, nay, bound, either
to forsake this society and seek the true church, or to allow
himself to be sent back by the true church to lead as
a priest. This, however, remains certain, that this spirit
of division with all that is unworthy in it and all its evil
consequences, is not brought about by religion but by the
want of religiousness in the multitude.

But here you raise a new objection, which seems once
more to roll back those reproaches upon religion. You
would remind me that I myself have said that the great
ecclesiastical society, I mean this institution for pupils in
religion, must take its priests only from the members of
.the true church, because in itself the true principle of
religiousness is wanting. How then can those who are
perfect in religion, endure so much that is utterly contrary
to the spirit of religion where they have to rule, where all
things obey their voice, and they obey only the voice of
religion! Nay, how do they produce so much that is evil,
for to whom does the church owe its regulations, if not to
the priests? Or if things are not as they should be, and the
government of the dependent society has been rent from
the members of the true church, where then is the high
spirit that is justly to be expected in them? Why have
they adniinistered so badly their most important province ?
Why have they allowed base passions to make that a

scourge of humanity, which in the hands of religion would
“2

164 FOURTH SPEECH.

have remained a blessing? And yet they are the persons
whose most joyful and sacred duty, as you confess, is to guide
those who need their help!

Truly, alas! things are not as I maintained they should
be. Who would venture to say that all, that even the
majority, that even the foremost and notablest of those
who for many a day have ruled the great ecclesiastical
assembly, have been accomplished in religion or even
members of the true church ?

Yet do not take what I say in excuse as mere subterfuge.
When you attack religion, it is usually in the name of
philosophy, and when you upbraid the church, it is usually
in the name of the state. You would defend the politicians
of every age on the ground that the interference of the
church has made so much of their handiwork imperfect and
ill-advised. If now, speaking in the name of the religious,
I attribute their failure to conduct their business with
better success, to the state and to statesmen, will you
suspect me of artifice? Yet if you will but hear what I
have to say of the true source of this evil, you will not, I
hope, be able to deny that I am right.

Every fresh doctrine and revelation, every fresh view of
the Universe that awakes the sense for it on some new side,
may win some minds for religion who by no other way
could be introduced into a higher world. To most of them
naturally this particular aspect then remains for them the
centre of religion. They form around their master a school
of their own, a self-existent, distinct part of the true and
universal church which yet only ripens slowly and quietly
towards union in spirit with the great whole. But before
this is accomplished, as soon as the new feelings have per-
meated and satisfied all their soul, they are usually violently
urged by the need to utter what is in them that they be
not consumed of the fire within. Thus everyone proclaims
the new salvation that has arisen for him. Every object
suggests the newly discovered Infinite; every speech turns

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 165

into a sketch of their peculiar religious views ; every counsel,
every wish, every friendly word is an inspired commenda-
tion of the sole way they know to salvation. Whosoever
knows how religion operates, finds it natural that they all
speak, for otherwise they would fear that the stones should
surpass them. And whosoever knows how a new enthusiasm
works, finds it natural that this living fire should kindle
violently around, consume some and warm many, and give to
thousands the surface imitation merely of a heart-felt glow.

And it is those thousands that work the mischief. The
youthful zeal of the new saints accepts them as true brethren.
What hinders, they say all too rashly, that these also should
receive the Holy Ghost? Nay, they themselves believe
that they have received, and, in joyous triumph, allow
themselves to be conducted into the bosom of the pious
society. But the intoxication of the first enthusiasm past,
the glowing surface burnt out, they show themselves in-
capable of enduring and sharing the state allotted to the
true believers. Compassionately the saints condescend to
them, and, to go to their help, relinquish their own higher
and deeper enjoyment. Thus everything takes that im-
perfect form. This comes to pass without outward causes
through the corruption common to all human things. In
accordance with that eternal order, the corruption most
quickly seizes upon the most fiery and active life, that any
section of the true church which might arise in isolation
anywhere in the world, might not remain apart from all cor-
ruption, but be compelled to participate in it and form a false
and degenerate church. In all times, among all peoples, in
every religion this has happened.

Yet if things were only left quietly to themselves, this
state could not anywhere long endure. Pour liquids of
various gravities and densities, having small power of
mutual attraction, into a vessel; shake them violently
together till they seem to form one liquid, and you will see,
if only you leave it quietly standing, how they will divide

166 FOURTH SPEECH.

and only like associate itself to like. So would it have
happened here, for it is the natural course of things. The
true church would quietly have separated itself again to
enjoy the higher, more intimate fellowship of which the
rest are not capable. The bond among those that remained
would then have been as good as loosed, and their natural
dulness would then have had to look for something from
without to determine what should become of them. And
they would not have been forsaken by the members of the
true church. Besides them, who would have had the
smallest call to care for their state? What attraction
would be offered to the regard of other men? What were
to be won or what fame to be obtained from them ?

The members of the true church could, therefore, have
remained in undisturbed possession and might have
entered upon their priestly office among them in a new and
better appointed form. Every man would then have
gathered around him those who best understood him, who
by his method could be most strongly stirred. Instead of the
vast association, the existence of which you now bewail, a
great crowd of smaller, less definite societies would have
arisen. In them men would in all kinds of ways, now here,
now there, have tested religion. They would have been only
States to be passed, preparatory for the time when the sense
for religion should awake, and decisive for those who should
be found incapable of being taken hold of in any way.”

Hail to those who shall first be called when, the simple
way of nature having failed, the revolutions of human
affairs shall, by a longer, more artificial way, lead in the
golden age of religion! May the gods be propitious to them,
and may a rich blessing follow their labours in their mission
to help beginners, and to smooth the way for the babes to
the temple of the Eternal—labours that in our present un-
favourable circumstances yield us such scanty fruit.”

Listen to what may possibly seem an unholy wish that I
can hardly suppress. Would that the most distant pre-

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 167

sentiment of religion had forever remained unknown to
all heads of states, to all successful and skilful politicians !
Would that not one of them had ever been seized by the
power of that infectious enthusiasm! The source of all
corruption has been, that they did not know how to separate
their deepest, most personal life from their office and
public character. Why must they bring their petty vanity
and marvellous presumption into the assembly of the saints,
asif the advantages they have to give were valid every-
where without exception? Why must they take back
with them into their palaces and judgment-halls the
reverence due to the servants of the sanctuary? Probably
you are right in wishing that the hem of a priestly garment
had never touched the floor of a royal chamber: but let us
wish that the purple had never kissed the dust on the altar,
for had this not happened the other would not have
followed. Had but no prince ever been allowed to enter
the temple, till he had put off at the gate the most beautiful
of his royal ornaments, the rich cornucopia of all his
favours and tokens of honour! But they have employed it
here as elxewhere. They have presumed to decorate the
simple grandeur of the heavenly structure with rags from
their earthly splendour, and instead of fulfilling holy vows,
they have Icft worldly gifts as offerings to the Highest.

As soon as a prince declared a church to be a community
with special privileges, a distinguished member of the civil
world, the corruption of that church was begun and almost
irrevocably decided. And if the society of believing
persons, and of persons desiring belief, had not been mixed
after a wrong manner, that is always to the detriment of
the former, this could not have happened, for otherwise no
religious society could ever be large enough to draw the
attention of the governor.

Such a constitutional act of political preponderance
works on the religious society like the terrible head of
Medusa. As soon as it appears everything turns to stone:

168 FOURTH SPEECH.

Though without connection, everything that is for a
moment combined, is now inseparably welded together;
accidental elements that might easily have been ejected
are now established for ever; drapery and body are made
from ene block and every unseemly fold is eternal. The
greater and spurious society can no more be separated from
the higher and smaller. It can neither be divided nor dis-
solved. It can neither alter its form nor its articles of faith.
Its views and usages are all condemned to abide in their
existing state.

But that is not all. The members of the true church
the visible church may contain, are forcibly excluded from
all share in its government, and are not in a position to do
for it even the little that might still be done. There is
more to govern than they either could or would do. There
are worldly things now to order and manage, and privileges
to maintain and make good. And even though in their
domestic and civil affairs, they did know how to deal with
such things, yet cannot they treat matters of this sort as
a concern of their priestly office. That is an incongruity
that their sense will not see into and to which they cannot
reconcile themselves. It does not accord with their high
and pure idea of religion and religious fellowship. They
cannot understand what they are to make out of houses and
lands and riches, either for the true church to which they
belong, or for the larger society which they should conduct.”
By this unnatural state of affairs the members of the true
church are distracted and perplexed.

But besides all this, persons are attracted who otherwise
would for ever have remained without. If it is the interest
of the proud, the ambitious, the covetous, the intriguing to
press into the church, where otherwise they would have felt
only the bitterest ennui, and if they begin to pretend
interest and intelligence in holy things to gain the earthly
reward, how can the truly religious escape subjection ?
And who bears the blame if unworthy men replace ripe

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 169

saints, and if, under their supervision, everything creeps
in and establishes itself that is most contrary to the spirit
of religion? Who but the state with its ill-considered
magnanimity ?

But in a still more direct way, the state is the cause
why the bond between the true church and the visible
religious society has been loosened. After showing to the
church this fatal kindness, it believed it had a right to its
active gratitude, and transferred to it three of its weightiest
commissions.” More or less it has committed to the church
the care and oversight of education. Under the auspices
of religion and in the form of a congregation, it demands
that the people be instructed in those duties that cannot
be set forth in the form of law, that they be stirred up to
a truly citizenlike way of thinking, and that, by the power
of religion, they be made truthful in their utterances. As
a recompense for those services, it robs it of its freedom, as
is now to be seen in all parts of the civilized world where
there is a state and a church. It treats the church as an
institution of its own appointment and invention—and
indeed its faults and abuses are almost all its own invent-
ing; and it alone presumes to decide who is fit to come
forward in this society as exemplar and as priest. And do
you still charge it to religion that the visible church does
not consist entirely of pious souls ?

But Iam not yet done with my indictment. The state
pollutes religious fellowship by introducing into its deepest
mysteries its own interests. When the church, in pro-
phetic devoutness, consecrates the new-born babe to the
Deity and to the struggle for the highest, the state will
take the occasion to receive it from the hands of the church
into the list of its protégés. When it gives the stripling
its first kiss of brotherhood, as one who has taken his first
glance into the sacred things of religion, this must also be
for the state the evidence of the first stage of civil indepen- .
dence ; '” if with pious wishes, it consecrates the union of

170 FOURTH SPEECH.

two persons who, as emblems and instruments of creative
nature, would at the same time consecrate themselves as
bearers of the higher life, it must also be the state’s sanc-
tion for the civil bond. The state will not even believe
- that a man has vanished from this earthly scene, till the
church assures it that it has restored his soul to the Infinite
and enclosed his dust in the sacred bosom of the earth. It
shows reverence for religion and an endeavour to keep
itself perpetually conscious of its own limits, that the state
bows before religion and before its worshippers when it
receives anything from the hands of the Infinite, or returns
it again, but how all this works for the corruption of the
religious society is clear enough. In all its regulations
there is nothing directed to religion alone, nothing even in
which religion is the chief matter. In the sacred speeches
and instructions, as well as in the most mysterious and
symbolical doings, everything has a legal and civil reference,”
everything is perverted from its original form and nature.
Hence there are many among the leaders of the church
who understand nothing of religion, but who yet, as servants
of the state, are in a position to earn great official merit, and
there are many among its members who do not even wish
to seek religion, and who yet have interest enough to
remain in the church and bear a part in it.

It is very apparent that a society to which such a thing
can happen, which with false humility accepts favours that
can profit it nothing and with cringing readiness takes on
burdens that send it headlong to destruction ; which allows
itself to be abused by an alien power, and parts with the
liberty and independence which are its birthright, for a
delusion ; which abandons its own high and noble aim to
follow things that lie quite outside of its path, cannot be a
society of men who have a definite aim and know exactly
what they wish. This glance at the history of the ecclesi-
astical society is, I think, the best proof that it is not strictly
a society of religious men. At most it appears that some

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 171

particles of such a society are mixed in it and are overlaid
with foreign ingredients. Before the first matter of this
boundless corruption could have been admitted, the whole
must have been in a state of morbid fermentation in which
the few sound portions soon utterly disappeared.

Full of sacred pride, the true church would have refused
gifts it could not use, well knowing that those who have
found the Deity and have a common joy in knowing Him,
have in the pure fellowship in which alone they would ex-
hibit and communicate their inmost nature, really nothing
in common the possession of which could be protected by
worldly power. On earth they require nothing but a
speech by which to make themselves understood and a
space in which to be together, things requiring no prince’s
favour.

But if the true church have nothing to do directly with
the profane world, and if there must be a mediating institu-
tion whereby to come into a certain contact with it, as it
were an atmosphere, both as a medium for purification and
for attracting new material, what form must this institution
take and how is it to be freed from the corruption it has
imbibed? This last question time must answer. Some-
time it will certainly be done, but it may be done in a
thousand different ways, for, of all sicknesses of man there
are various ways of cure. Everything in its place will be
tried and have its effect. The goal only I can indicate in
order to show you more clearly that here also it has not
been religion and its endeavour to which you should have
manifested your repugnance.

The fundamental, idea of such an auxiliary institution

‘is to exhibit to persons who in any degree have a sense for

religion, though because it is not yet apparent and conscious,
they are not fit for incorporation into the true church,
so much religion as such that their capacity must neces-
sarily be developed. Let us now see what there is in
the present state of things that hinders this from taking

172 FOURTH SPEECH.

place. I will not repeat that the state chooses accord-
ing to its own wishes which are more directed to the
extraneous matters in the institution, persons to be leaders
and teachers, and that in the view of the state a man
can be a highly intelligent educator and a single-minded
effective teacher of duties to the people without, in the
strict sense of the word, being religiously affected at all,
and that therefore persons whom it reckons among its.
worthiest servants, may easily fail utterly. I will grant
that everyone it appoints is truly influenced and inspired
by piety, if you will grant that no artist can communicate
his art to a school with any success, if there is not among
his pupils some equality of preliminary knowledge. This
is more necessary in respect of oursubject where the master
can do nothing but point out and exhibit, than in art where
the scholar progresses by exercise and the teacher is chiefly
useful by criticisms. All his work will be in vain if the
same thing is not only intelligible to all, but suitable and
wholesome. The sacred orator must obtain his hearers by
a certain similarity of talents and cast of mind, and not
by rank and file, not as they are counted out to him by
some ancient distribution, not as their houses adjoin, or as
they are set down in the police list.”

And assuming that only persons equally near religion
assemble round one master, they may not all be near in
the same way. It is, therefore, most preposterous to wish
to limit any pupil to a single master. There is no one so
universally cultured in religion, nor anyone who can exer-
cise all kinds of influence. No man is in a position to
draw by his representation and speech from all who come
before him the hidden gems of religion to light, for the
sphere of religion is far too comprehensive. Remember
the different ways by which men pass from consciousness
of the individual and particular to the Whole and the
Infinite : remember that, by this very mode of transition,
a man’s religion assumes its own distinct character. Think

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 3:

of the various influences whereby the Universe affects man,
of the thousand single perceptions and of the thousand
ways of combining them and showing one in the light of the
other. Reflect, that if religion is actually to stir a man’s
own feeling, he must meet it in the definite form that suits
his capacity and his point of view. It is, therefore, im-
possible for any master to be all things to all, and to become
to every man what he needs. No one can be a mystic and
a scientist at the same time. He cannot be a master in
every sacred art whereby religion is expressed, initiated
at once into prophecies, visions and prayers, into presenta-
tions from history and from experience and into many
other things too numerous to mention, all the glorious
branches into which the crown of the heavenly tree of
priestly art is divided. Master and disciples, therefore,
must, in perfect freedom, be allowed to seek and choose
what profits them, and no one must in any way be obliged
to give except that which he possesses and understands.

But it is not possible for a man to limit his teaching to
what he understands as soon as, in the very same trans-
action, he must have something else in view. Without
question, a priestly man can present his religion with zeal
and skill as is fitting, and at the same time remain faithful
to some civil business and accomplish it effectively. Why
then, if it suits, should not a person, having a call to the
priesthood, be at the same time a moral teacher in the
service of the state? ‘There is nothing against it. He
may do both, only not the one in and through the other ;
he must not wear both natures at the same time, not
accomplish the two concerns by the one action. The
state may be satisfied, if it so pleases, with a religious
morality, but religion rejects consciously and individually
every prophet and priest that moralizes from this point of
view. Whosoever would proclaim religion must do it
unadulterated.

It is opposed to every sentiment of honour of a master in

174 FOURTH SPEECH.

his business, and more particularly of a master in religious
purity, if a true priest has to do with the state on such
unworthy and impossible conditions. When the state takes
other workmen into its pay, whether for the better cultiva-
tion of their own talents or to attract pupils, it removes
from them all extraneous business, nay, it makes it incum-
bent upon them to refrain. It recommends them to give
themselves chiefly to the special section of their art, in
which they believe they can accomplish most, and then it
allows their nature full scope. With the artists of religion
alone, it does exactly the contrary. They must embrace
the whole compass of their subject, and it prescribes to
them what school they shall be of and lays upon them un-
seemly burdens. It will not even, along with attention to
its business, grant them leisure for special cultivation of
some kind of religious presentation which yet is for them
the chief matter, nor free them from burdensome con-
straints. Even after it has, as in every case it must, set
up for itself a school of civil duties,” it still will not allow
them to follow their own ways. And yet, though it cannot
be unconcerned about the priestly works, it employs them
neither for use nor for show like other arts and sciences !
Away then with every such union between church and
state!® That remains my Cato’s utterance to the end, or
till I see the union actually destroyed.

Away too with all that has even a semblance to rigid
union of priest and laity, whether among themselves or
with each other !** Learners shall not form bodies, for,
even in mechanical trades, it can be seen how little that
profits. And the priests, I mean as such, shall form no
brotherhood among themselves. They shall neither divide
their work nor their knowledge according to corporations,
but let each man do his own duty without concerning him-
self about others, or having in this matter closer connection
with one than with another. Between teacher and congre-
gation also, there shall be no firm outward band. Accord-

on

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 175

ing to the principles of the true church, the mission of a
priest in the world is a private business, and the temple
should also be a private chamber where he lifts up his voice
to give utterance to religion. Let there be an assembly
before him and not a congregation. Let him be a speaker
for all who will hear, but not a shepherd for a definite
flock.

Only under such conditions, can truly priestly souls take
charge of seekers for religion. ‘Thus only can this pre-
paratory association actually lead to religion and make
itself worthy to be regarded as an adjunct and vestibule of
the true church, for thus only it can lose all that in its pre-
sent state is unholy and irreligious. By universal freedom
of choice, recognition and criticism, the hard and pro-
nounced distinction between priest and laity will be
softened, till the best of the laity come to stand where the
priests are. All that is now held together by the unholy
bond of creeds will be severed.” Let there be no point of
union of this kind, and let none offer the seekers a system
making exclusive claim to truth, but let each man offer his
characteristic, individual presentation. This appears the
sole means for putting an end to the mischief. It is a
poor, if old device, capable only of alleviating the evil for
a moment, when ancient formulas were too oppressive or
were too varied to consort in the same bonds, to cut up the
church by partition of the creed. Like a polypus, each
piece grows again into a whole, and if the character is con-
trary to the spirit of religion, it is no improvement that
several societies should bear it. The visible religious
society can only be brought nearer the universal freedom
and majestic unity of the true church by becoming a mobile
mass, having no distinct outlines, but each part being now
here, now there, and all peacefully mingling together. The
hateful sectarian and proselytizing spirit which leads ever
farther astray from the essentials of religion, can only be
extinguished when no one, any more, is informed that he

!

176 FOURTH SPEECH.

belongs toa distinct circle, and is for other circles of a
different faith.

In regard to this society, you see, our wishes are iden-
tical. What is obnoxious to you opposes us also. Permit
me, however, always to add that this would not have been
as it is, if we had only been left alone to occupy ourselves
in our own proper work. Our common interest is to have
the evil removed, but there is little we can do except to
- wish and hope. How such a change will take place among
us Germans I do not know. Will it be, as in neighbouring
countries, only after a great commotion and then every-
where at once? Will the state, by an amicable arrange-
ment and without the death and resurrection of both
church and state, break off its unhappy marriage with the
church? Or will it endure that another, more virginal
institution arise alongside of the one that is for ever sold to
it?” Ido not know.

But till something of this kind do happen, a heavy fate
must lie upon all holy souls, who, glowing with religion,
would seek to exhibit their most holy things even in the
profane world, that something might thereby be accom-
plished. I will not delude the members of the state
privileged order into making much account of what in
these circumstances they can accomplish by speech for the
dearest wish of their heart. Andif many of them believe
themselves bound not to be always speaking only of piety,
nay, not even frequently to speak chiefly of it and to speak
of it alone only on solemn occasions, if they are not to be un-
true to their political calling, I know little to say against it.

But this cannot be taken from them, that they can pro-
claim by a priestlike life the spirit of religion, and this may
be their consolation and their. best reward. In a holy
person everything is significant; in an acknowledged priest
of religion everything has a canonical meaning. They
may, therefore, in all their movements exhibit the nature
of religion. Even in the common relations of life nothing

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 177

may be lost of the expression of a pious mind. The holy
ardour with which they treat everything shows that even in
trifles that a profane spirit skims over thoughtlessly, the
music of noble feelings resounds in them. The majestic
calm with which they equalize small and great, shows that
they refer everything to the Unchangeable and in all
things alike perceive the Deity. The bright serenity with
which they pass every trace of decay, reveals to all how
they live above time and above the world. The utmost
ease of self-denial indicates how much of the limits of
personality they have already abolished. The constantly
open and active sense that neither the rarest nor the
commonest escapes, shows how unweariedly they seek the
Deity and listen for His voice. If in this way the whole
life and every movement of soul and body is a priestlike
work of art, the sense for what dwells in them may by this
dumb speech be awakened in many.

And not content to express the nature of religion, they
must also in a similar way destroy the false appearance of
it. With childlike ingenuousness, and in the high simplicity
of utter unconsciousness, seeing no danger, and feeling
no need of courage, they disregard what base prejudices
and subtle superstition have surrounded with a spurious
glory of sanctity. Unconcerned as the infant Hercules,
they let themselves be hissed at from all quarters by the
snakes of solemn calumny, being able to crush them quietly
ina moment. To this holy service they may devote them-
selves till better times, and I think that you also will have
reverence for this unassuming worth, and will augur well
for its influence on men.

But what am I to say to those to whom you refuse the
priestly robe because they have not gone through a definite
course of science in a definite way ? Whither shall I direct
them with the social bent of their religion not directed
alone to the true church, but also outward to the world ?
Having no greater scene in which, in any striking way,

N

178 FOURTH SPEECH.

they might appear, they may rest satisfied with the priestly
service of their household gods.” One family can be the
most cultured element and the truest picture of the Uni-
verse. When quietly and securely all things work together,
all the powers that animate the Infinite are thus operative ;
when all advances in quiet joyousness, the high World-
Spirit rules in it; when the music of love accompanies all
movements, the harmony of the spheres resounds, resounds
in the smallest space. They may construct this sanctuary,
order it and cherish it. In pious might they may set it up
clearly and evidently ; with love and spirit they may dis-
pose it. By this means many will learn to contemplate
the Universe in the small, obscure dwelling. It will be a
Holy of Holies in which many will receive the consecration
of religion. This priesthood was the first in the holy and
infant world, and it will be the last when no other is any
longer necessary.

Nay, at the end of our future culture we expect a time
when no other society preparatory for religion except the
pious family life will be required. At present, millions of
men and women of all ranks sigh under a load of mechani-
cal and unworthy labours. The older generation succumbs
discouraged, and, with pardonable inertness, abandons the
younger generation to accident in almost everything, except
the necessity straightway to imitate and learn the same
degradation. That is the cause why the youth of the people
do not acquire the free and open glance whereby alone the
object of piety is found. There is no greater hindrance to
religion than that we must be our own slaves, and everyone
is a slave who must execute something it ought to be
possible to do by dead force. We hope that by the perfect-
ing of sciences and arts, those dead forces will be made
serviceable to us, and the corporeal world, and everything
of the spiritual that can be regulated, be turned into an
enchanted castle where the god of the earth only needs to
utter a magic word or press a spring, and what he requires

ASSOCIATION IN RELIGION. 179

will be done. Then for the first time, every man will be
free-born ; then every life will be at once practical and con-
templative; the lash of the task-master will be lifted over
no man; and everyone will have peace and leisure for con-
templating the world in himself. It is only the unfortunate
to whom this is wanting, from whose spiritual organs all
nourishing forces are withdrawn, because their whole being
must be spent untiringly in mechanical service that need
individual, fortunate souls to come forward and assemble
them about them, to be their eye for them, and in a few
swift minutes communicate to them the highest content of
a life. But when the happy time comes and everyone can
freely exercise and use his sense, at the very first awaking
of the higher powers, in sacred youth, under the care of
paternal wisdom, all who are capable will participate in
religion. All communication that is not mutual will then
cease, and the father, well repaid, will lead the stout son,
not only into a more joyful world and a lighter life, but
straightway into the sacred assembly also of the wor-
shippers of the Eternal, now increased in number and
activity.

In the grateful feeling that, when this better time has
come, however far off it may still be, the efforts to which
you have devoted your days, shall have contributed some-
what to its coming, permit me once more to direct your
attention to the fair fruit of your labour. Allow yourselves
to be led once more to the exalted fellowship of truly
religious souls. It is dispersed and almost invisible, but
its spirit rules everywhere, even where butfew are gathered
in the name of the Deity. What is there in it that should
not fill you with admiration and esteem, ye friends and
admirers of the good and beautiful? They are among
themselves an academy of priests. ‘he exhibition of the
holy life, which for them is the highest, is treated by every-
one as his art and study, and the Deity out of His endless
riches apportions to each one his own lot. To a universal

N 2

180 FOURTH SPEECH.

sense for everything belonging to the sacred sphere of
religion, every man joins as artists should, the endeavour
to perfect himself in some one department. A noble
rivalry prevails, and a longing to produce something worthy
of such an assembly makes everyone with faithfulness and
diligence master all that belongs to his special section. In
a pure heart it is preserved, with concentrated mind it is
arranged, by heavenly art it is moulded and perfected.
Thus in every way and from every source, acknowledgment
and praise of the Infinite resound, everyone bringing, with
joyous heart, the ripest fruit of his thinking and examining,
of his comprehending and feeling. They are also among
themselves a choir of friends. Everyone knows that he is
both a part and a work of the Universe, in him also its
divine life and working being revealed. He, therefore,
regards himself as an object worthy of the attention of
others. With sacred reserve, yet with a ready openness
that all may enter and behold, he lays bare everything of
the relations of the Universe of which he is conscious and
what of the elements of humanity takes individual shape in
him. Why should they hide anything from one another ?
All that is human is holy, for all is divine. Again, they
are among themselves a band of brothers—or have you
perhaps an intenser expression for the entire blending of
their natures, not in respect of existence and working, but
in respect of sense and understanding ? The more every-
one approaches the Universe and the more they communicate
to one another, the more perfectly they all become one. No
one has a consciousness for himself, each has also that of his
neighbour. They are no longer men, but mankind also,
Going out of themselves and triumphing over themselves,
they are on the way to true immortality and eternity.

If in any other department of life, or in any other school
of wisdom, you have found anything nobler than this, impart
it to me; mine I have given you.

EXPLANATIONS OF THE FOURTH SPEECH.

(1) Page 150.—The assertion that scripture alone is sufficent to
awake piety, seems to have experience against it, from the sacred
writings of all religions down to our books for edification so widely
distributed among a certain class, and the small religious pamphlets
which are the means chiefly used at present for reaching the people.
First, in respect of the sacred writings, only those of monotheistic
religions need detain us. The Koran alone has arisen purely as a
writing, and it is indisputably to be looked upon mostly as a manual
and repertorium of themes for religious compositions, a fact quite
in accordance with the unoriginal character of this religion. And
the direct, strictly religious influence of the Koran is not to be
esteemed very highly. In the very various Jewish codex, the gnomic
books especially have something of this purely literary character.
The historical section, strictly speaking, has none. The poetical section
again in part, as for example a large number of the Psalms, deals
immediately with definite occasions and was not produced simply
for indefinite use, and is, therefore, not scripture in the strict sense.
And who will deny that they produced the effect in this connection
of which their present influence as mere scripture is but a shadow P
The prophetic poetry of the earlier period, was for the most part
actually spoken, and a not insignificant part has been handed down
imbedded in history. As this living traditional power was lost, and
the Scriptures became to the Jewish people a learned study, its direct
influence was lost, and it became simply the bearer of the living
utterances linked to it. The New Testament Scriptures also are, as
little as possible, writing in the strict sense of the word. In the
historical books the speeches are the most essential, the history being
chiefly to give them the movement of life. Even in the history of
the Passion the words of Christ are the most sublime and deeply
moving parts, and the narrative of pains and agonies might easily
produce only a wrong effect. The Acts of the Apostles alone seems

182 FOURTH SPEECH.

to be an exception, and to have its place in the canon chiefly because
it is the root of all church history. But just because it would quite
limit the book to this subordinate use, it is repugnant to our feeling
when the speeches are regarded as subsequently concocted, as is the
fashion of other historical books. Our didactic books, being letters,
are as little as possible mere literature, and no one can deny that the
influence on the immediate recipients to whom the whole movement
of the time was present, must have been much greater. Wecan only
dimly, and then only by learned help, transport ourselves back to
those times. Even then, the most vital influence of those writings
for our time is that which was borrowed from the synagogue that
all living religious utterance is linked to them.

For that reason only, the reading of the Scriptures by the laity
continues; otherwise, its influence would not entirely vanish, but it
would degenerate into utter vagueness. So vast was the original
power of these productions that even now, after they have become
entirely literature, a fulness of quickening spirit dwells in them,
which is the highest testimony to their divine power; yet the objective
side of this influence, the clear understanding, would soon be null
for the private use of the laity, but for that connection with the
learned exposition. Itis, therefore, natural that the Catholic Church,
setting little store on preaching, should limit the use of Scripture
by the laity. On the other hand, we, believing we dare not so limit
it, must make the public exposition of Scripture much more prominent
in preaching, and it must always be hurtful to the whole religious
life when Scripture is generally made use of for preaching simply as
a motto. The reality of the endeavour to rescue the contents of the
sacred books from the state of being mere literature, appears from
the ready adoption by the most pious Christians of a method that
would be in the highest degree unnatural in a work made throughout
purely as a book. Single detached passages of Scripture, neither
chosen by selection nor by memory, but simply by chance, are used
on every occasion, when religious enlightenment or stimulus is needed.
This cannot be defended, as it too easily degenerates into magical
frivolity, yet it is an endeavour to restore to the religious utterances
of holy men a living influence which shall be direct and independent
of their effects as a book.

As regards our literature for edification again, which arises for the
mcst part expressly as books, its great influence is not to be denied.
The countless editions and the continuance of many of them through
a long series of generations speak too clearly. And who does not
feel respect for works that, in addition to their vitality, help to guard

EXPLANATIONS, 183

a great mass of men from the dangerous whirlwind of changing
doctrine P Yet it will not be denied that the living word and the
religious emotion in a community, have a far higher power than the
written letter. On closer consideration also it will be found that the
chief influence of practical writings rests less in their completeness
than in the multitude of forceful, noble formulas contained, which may
embrace many religious moments, and therefore refresh the memory
of many things. They also offer a certain assurance that one’s own
religious emotions are not at variance with the common religious life.
Hence the individual, clever work of this kind seldom rejoices in much
success. This good witness is only given to able and comprehensive
practical works. But the present endeavour of so many well-meaning
societies to scatter a multitude of small religious leaflets among the
people, that have no right objective character, but utter the most
subjective inner experiences in the dead letter of a terminology that
neither accords with literary nor religious usage, rests on a deep
misunderstanding, and can scarcely have any other result than to bring
church matters, the evil of which it presupposes, into still deeper
degradation. A multitude of men will be reared who will have
manifold hypocrisies, without any actual experience, or who will fall
into sad perplexity because their own religious experiences do not
accord with the pattern set before them. Is the public church life
sick or weak, let each man do his utmost to heal it, but let no man
believe it is to be replaced by a dead letter. That the religious life
should issue from the circulating library seems to me like handing
over the great acts of legislation and executive to irresponsible
journals, of which the more numbers and improved editions the
better.

(2) Page 150.—Many perhaps, who formerly cherished the well-meant
wish that the sociality which had become vain and frivolous should
have new life put into it by an admixture of the religious element,
have already applied the proverb to themselves that with time we
may easily have too much of what earlier we zealously desired.
Confusion and trouble enough have arisen from treating religious
subjects in brilliant circles in the form of conversation, in which
the personal element too easily preponderates. I wrote then from
my youthful experiences among the Moravians. They had special
meetings for the distinct object of religious conversation. An absent
person of a different mind could not there readily be discussed, yet I
have never heard anything of real life and worth, and I believe I have
here quite rightly grasped the general principle. Our wish should»
therefore, be not so much that in our free sociality religious subjects

184 FOURTH SPEECH.

should be treated, as that a religious spirit should rule. And this
wish will certainly not fail as soon as a considerable part of society
consists of religious men.

(3) Page 151.—Since this was written I have had almost thirty
years’ conduct of office, a period within which every man must come
as near his ideal as he can. A greater contrast between that
description, and what I myself have accomplished in that time in
the domain of religious speech would be hard to imagine. Were
there really such a difference of theory and practice, my only apology
would be that, as it was given to Socrates, other wisdom being denied,
to know that he knew nothing, the higher not being granted me, I
was content with plain speech rather than strive for false orna-
mentation. Yetit is not quite so. My practice has been based on
the distinction that is drawn later in this Speech between the existing
church and the true church. In the former all discourse, whatever
be its subject-matter, must have a didactic character. The speaker
would bring something to consciousness in his hearers, which indeed
he assumes to exist in them, but does not suppose would develop
of itself in this exact way. Now the more the didactic character
appears, the less room there is for ornament, and for this purpose
a blessing undoubtedly rests on unadorned speech. In another
religious art, the same thing appears. Who would think of taking
the pious poetry, in all its power and magnificence, that is suited
for glorifying God in a circle of thoroughly cultured religious men,
of which we have many splendid examples in our Klopstock and our
Hardenberg, and making it the standard in collecting a church
hymn-book P

(4) Page 151.—It can hardly be necessary for me here to guard
myself against being misinterpreted, as wishing to banish all order
from the assembly of the truly pious, and make them like many
fanatical sects that arrange nothing beforehand for their meetings,
but leave everything to the moment. On the contrary, the higher
the style of religious utterance, the more it exhibits an artistically
organized unity, the more it requires a rigid order. This only is
meant that everything belonging to civil order must be left outside,
and all things must be fashioned on the foundation of an original,
universal equality. I hold this the essential condition of all prosperity
in such a fellowship, not less in the actually existing church than
in the ideal. Every fellowship is destroyed by disorder, and an order
that is made for another society is disorder. If the distinction
between priest and laity is not to be sharply drawn, how much less
is a difference to apply among the laity themselves that belongs to a

EXPLANATIONS. 185

quite different sphere. Ifa member of the congregation, even though
outwardly he may stand in some relation of guardian to it, assumes
the right, because he is distinguished in the civil society, to interfere
and have priestly functions in directing the body and arranging the
meetings, any other member, however low his station in the civil
society, would have the same right, and true and fitting order would
be at an end.

(5) Page 153.—Every reader familiar with Scripture, will here think
of the Apostle Peter, who exhorts all Christians to train themselves
into a holy priesthood, and assures them all that they are a royal
priesthood. This is, therefore, a truly Christian expression. The
view here set forth of the equality of all true members of the religious
community, so that none are to be made merely recipient and the
exclusive right of utterance given to one, is also a truly Christian
view. Christianity has recognized its true goal in that prophetic
saying that all should be taught of God. Suppose this goal attained
by the whole community, so that there was no more need to awake
religion in others, then, leaving out of sight the education of the
young, there could be no distinction among members, save such as
the passing occasion required. If then we find in all religious forms,
from the earliest antiquity, the distinction between priest and laity
in force, we are driven to assume, either that there was an original
difference, a religiously developed stock that had joined a rude race
and had never succeeded in raising it to its own fulness of religious
life, or that the religious life had developed so unequally in a people
that it had become necessary, if it were not again to be scattered,
to organize the more advanced for more effective operation on the
rest. In this latter case the more it succeeds the more superfluous
this organization will become. The Christian priesthood is manifestly
of this kind. This narrower use of the word I never quite justify
to myself, for we in the Protestant community are quite agreed how
far the expression generally can have no validity in Christianity.
The need for this narrower priesthood only gradually made itself
felt. This is the more apparent that, at the beginning, the apostolic
character itself involved no special pre-eminence in the community.
But this smaller body, chosen from the community, came to acquire
a position apart from the religious enthusiasm of the others, because
the history of Christianity and in particular the intimate knowledge
of original Christianity necessarily became an object of science. In
this scientific information all had to have some share, if their
communications were to be in conscious agreement with history.
This distinction could never disappear till all Christians were

186 FOURTH SPEECH.

familiar with this science. Even though this is not to be looked for,
the validity of this distinction must ever more and more be limited
to the sphere in which finally alone it can have a reason.

(6) Page 153.—This assertion, from which I afterwards draw the
conclusion that the external religious society should be as mobile a.
body as possible, seems to contradict what I have exhaustively
developed in the Introduction to the “ Glaubenslehre,” §§ 7-10.
Here I say that in religious communication there are no entire
separationsand definite boundaries except by a mechanical procedure,
that is a procedure which isin a certain sense arbitrary and not
founded in the nature of the matter. There I say that the different
pious communions that appear in history stand to one another,
partly, as stages of development, the monotheistic being the highest,
and, partly, as different in kind, according as the natural or the
ethical in human life predominated. Further, I distinguish the
individual type of common piety, partly externally, by its historical
origin, and partly internally, as characteristic variation of any faith
of one stage and one kind. It will not suffice to say that in the
“ Glaubenslehre ” communion is secondary, and that the primary aim
was to discover from their contents the characteristie. features of the
different types of faith, particularly of Christianity, for this involves
dealing with the Christian church as a definitely bounded society.
The two passages are rather to be harmonized as follows: On the
one side, I grant here that certain bodies of communion are formed
organically, which agrees with the assertion in the “ Glaubenslehre ”
that every distinct communion has a historical point of departure
which dominates the organic development. Did this point of
departure not also presuppose an inner difference, these bodies
would only be distinguished by number or by size, and the superiority
given by favouring circumstances, like the fruits of one stem. Were
their boundaries to touch they would naturally grow together, and
could only be again mechanically divided. On the other side, in the
“ Glaubenslehre,” an inner difference in the types of faith, whereby
the communions are divided, is maintained. Butit is only difference
in the subordination and mutual relations of the separate parts,
which does not involve any greater degree of communion than is
here represented. ‘I'he whole attempt there made would be in vain,
if from one type of faith it were not possible to understand another.
But if it is understood in its inner nature, its modes of externalizing
itself, its services must be capable not only of being understood by
a spectator, but in some degree of being appropriated. Persons to
whom this is impossible, can in any communion be only the un-

EXPLANATIONS. 187

cultured. Now that is simply what is here maintained, that the
separating impulse, when it makes a hard and fast cleavage, is a
proof of imperfection. Again, as the uncultured do not alone, but
only along with the cultured, form the communion, the assertions
there made also agree with this that the religious communion, though
divided and organized, would yet in another respect be only one but
for mechanical interference either of sword or letter. Does it not
appear to us violent and irreligious, when the members of one
communion are forbidden to frequent, with a view to edification,
the services of another? Yet only by such an utterly mechanical
procedure could the communions be quite separated.

. (7) Pages 155 and 156.— It was doubtless serviceable to establish that
the wild mania for proselytizing is nowhere founded in religion itself.
But there seems to be too much here, for mild proselytizing also,
every endeavour to draw from another form to one’s own, every
endeavour to implant religion in souls still without piety, seems to
be rejected. Against the witness of all history, against the clear
words of the Founder Himself, no less than against my own state-
ments in the “ Glaubenslehre,” about the relation of Christianity to
other forms of religion, it appears to be maintained that the spread
of Christianity in the world did not proceed from the pious Christian
sense. But this good endeavour is always in some way connected
with the notion, here uniformly rejected, that salvation, either
altogether or in a much higher degree, is not to be found outside a
definite religious communion as it isfoundinside. Trueand false do
not seem 10 be here sufficiently distinguished. If the assertion that
proselytizing work is entirely inadmissible, is a just consequence of
the previously accepted theory of the religious communion, the error
must be sought in the theory. On going back upon it we find what
solves the difficulties, that the spread of our own form of religion
is a natural and permissible private business of the individual.
Though there is in the strict sense only one universal religious com-
munion, in which all the different forms of religion mutually recog-
nize each other, in which transference of a follower of one form to
another seems to be a wish to impair the whole by destroying its
manifoldness, it is manifest that here also much is naturally
destroyed, which can only happen in an inferior stage of development.
Hence it is regarded by the experienced as simply a point of transi-
tion, and it cannot be wrong to accelerate and guide the progress.
Wherefore, the more the adherents of one form of religion are com-
pelled to regard many other forms simply as such transitions, the more
powerfully will the work of proselytizing organize itself among them.

188 FOURTH SPEECH.

This should most apply to the monotheistic religions in general, and
in the broadest sense to Christianity. And this holds from the
present standpoint, as it is more fully dealt with in the “ Glaubens-
lehre,” as the issue of a more scientific course of thought. The
work of proselytizing presupposes the one graduated communion. .
As Paul did in Athens, regarding the Hellenic idolatry, to assign it
a value and obtain a link of connection for the communication of his
own piety, it must always be done. This community of two forms
of religion shows itself at all points wheresoever a like effort at
assimilation is developed. We can therefore say that this is the
true distinction between praiseworthy zeal for conversion that would
recognize the faintest traces of religion and purify and build up a piety
already begun, and that wild irreligious mania for conversion which
easily degenerates into persecution. The former begins with un-
prejudiced and loving comprehension even of the most imperfect kind
of faith, the latter believes it is exalted above any such endeavour.
Further, it is not to be understood with too painful accuracy that
proselytizing can only be the private business of the individual.
The individual stands here opposed to the all-embracing communion.
Hence associations of individuals, nay, a whole mode of faith can
be regarded as individuals. The maxim “nulla salus,” again has
for the great communion of the pious an absolute verity, for without
any piety it can acknowledge no salvation. Only in so far as one
religious party utters it against another, does it work destructively,
which is to say, in so far as a universal communion is denied.
Hence it clearly goes along with the wild mania for conversion.
The special truth of this in Christianity is dealt with in the
“Glaubenslehre,” in full agreement with these views.

(8) Page 157.—The propensity, found in all great forms of religion,
at all times, in varying degree and under the most different shapes,
to form smaller and warmer societies within the great one, rests
undeniably on the presumption that the great society has fallen into
deep corruption. This expresses itself in separatism which accepts
generally the type of doctrine, but will have nothing to do with the
regulations of the religious society. Manifestly therefore, it must
maintain that the regulations of the society are independent of its
doctrine, and determined by something alien, and that in conse-
quence the members of the religious society are in a state of sickness.
After what is said above about the social nature of piety, no one will
believe that I am here speaking of separatist piety. On the contrary,
it is rather of the endeavour to found closer associations more
accordant with the idea of the true church. But this praise associa-

EXPLANATIONS. 189

tions only deserve when they unfold a rich productiveness in
religious communication, not when they are founded on a narrow and
exclusive letter, and reject the idea of one all-embracing com-
munion. Is this the case and productiveness is weak or quite fails,
the state of sickness is not to be denied. Hence among all similar
societies the Moravian Brethren, who have at least produced a
characteristic type of poetry, are always pre-eminent. Religious
speech also among them has more scope and variety, for, besides the
general assembly, the community is divided up in various ways. A
very beautiful scheme at least is not to be denied, and if the result
is less rich, a deficiency in the cultivation of talent may be to blame.
In other directions also this society has taken a good and praise-
worthy course. It has rejected that exclusiveness of the letter which
keeps the two chief branches of the Protestant Church apart, and
stands in manifold relations to the whole of this church according
as occasion offers. In its missionary efforts, moreover, in which it
must be acknowledged to excel, it has displayed a pure and right
tact and a happy readiness in reaching the most imperfect states of
religion and awaking receptiveness for the high spirit of Christianity.
Where the sense for such closer union is awakened, the contempt of
the recognized church, in its existing state, is natural. But this
contempt is here ascribed to all who, in a higher sense, are religious
and the next step is, that from this state the endeavour must go
forth to improve the great outward society itself and bring it nearer
its natural union with the true church.

(9) Page 158.—This description may very well be quite in accord-
ance with the form which our assemblies for divine service, broadly
considered, showed at that time. In any case it was the result of an
immediate impression. Yet the consequence that the principle of
communion in these assemblies is entirely different from what has
actually been developed, is not to be drawn straightway, but only
under the following limitations. Further on, page 178, family
worship is assigned to members of the true church, who do not have
the requisite endowments for coming forward in personal activity
and priestly function in the outward religious society, that they may
there satisfy their impulse to communicate. Now persons who are
in this position cannot, despite outward appearance, be merely
passive and receptive in the assemblies of the church. They carry
the work of the church further, and their activity is actually in
the assembly. Thus when public and family worship are
regarded as one, the whole of the larger assembly appears as an
active organism. This activity would also have its influence in the

190 FOURTH SPEECH.

assembly if several families were to join for a pious purpose, if the
leader of the assembly had this inner productiveness of its members
before his mind. Wherefore, the consequence would only be rightly
drawn where no religious communication had developed itself in
domestic life and family intercourse, a thing seldom found at that —
time in our country. Further, religious communication is also an
art, not determined by piety only, but by training also. Hence
entire equality and reciprocity are not possible. Compare great re-
presentations in any art. In music, for example, the composer is
not the only person, but the performers also, from the leading
instrument to the most subordinate accompanyist. Then there
must be the maker of the musical instruments, and the audience too,
if they are connoisseurs, do not merely receive, but each one in his
own way also has his work. Similarly we must acknowledge that in
the assemblies of the church the greatest number can only contribute
to the representation of the whole as accompanying artists. Thus one-
sidedness only fully appears when such co-operation entirely fails, either
the piety doing nothing but absorb, or the speaking and working being
offered simply from a profane artistic sense without religious spirit.
(10) Page 159.—If this were taken quite exactly, the result would
certainly be that the visible church would exist only through its own
nullity, through its incapacity to bring the religious feeling to any
high degree of keenness. But that it is not to be taken exactly is
manifest, because otherwise this cold and proud withdrawal from the
visible church would be praised, in direct contradiction to the previous
contention that this great religious society is by no means to be dis-
solved. Yet here, as in all similar human things, there are grada-
tions, founded in the original constitution of the individual. Persons
of different grades are directed by nature to one another, but it is
only a shallow view that one simply affects the other, as if one could
simply by working on another implant religion in him. Religion
is original in every man, and stirsin every man. In some, however,
it keeps pace with the whole individuality of the person, so that, in
every manifestation of the pious consciousness, this individuality
appears; in others, again, religion only appears under the form of the
common feeling. And this may be so even in persons otherwise of
marked individuality. The religious emotions are linked to the
common states of things, and find in the common presentation their
satisfaction. Were persons of more individual emotion now to with-
draw from those common forms of presentation, both parties would
eiffer loss. What would become of the common presentations un-
fertilized by individual emotions we can see ın the ecclesiastical

EXPLANATIONS. | 191

societies in which individuality generally is in the background, and
all rests on steadfast formulas. The Armenian and Greek churches,
unless, indeed, the latter be now receiving a new impulse, appear to
be quite dead, and only to be moved mechanically. The individual
again, however strong and characteristic his life may be, who leaves
the common ground, gives over the largest range of his conscious-
ness, and, if the true church nowhere shows itself in actuality,
nothing remains for him but an isolated, separatist existence, always
decaying from want of a larger circulation.

(11) Page 160.—Seeing that in this passage the view that dominates
this whole Speech is here presented most decisively and compactly,
it may be best to say what remains to be said in explanation and
justification of it. The whole matter resolves itself into the right
representation of the relation between the perfectly mutual com-
munication, here regarded as the true church, and the actually
existing religious communion. The state of this communion is
acknowledged to be capable of such an improvement as is described
further on p. 166. This being assumed, the question stands thus:
Should there be in this educational society, besides the priestly work
which only those fully cultured religiously should exercise, a special
communion of such persons corresponding to the idea of the church
to which the members of the visible religious society might, in the
measure of their progress, go over? Now the greatest masters are
required for the greatest representations. We have seen every
master, who would have his full effect, requires ‘subordinate artists
and a worthy, an informed, a responsive audience. Further, great
masters are too rare, and too much dispersed to fashion alone this
twofold sphere. What remains for us then but to say that, in
corporeal and visible form, such a society is nowhere to be found on
earth. The best of this kind to be actually discovered, is that
improved type of the existing church, those societies in which a
skilful master gathers around him a number of kindred souls whom
he fires and fashions. The more the members of this circle advance
and fashion that twofold sphere, the more such a company is a great
presentation of religion. For those who are the soul of such a
presentation, there is the higher fellowship which consists in mutual
intercourse and insight. The other members share in so far as they
succeed in raising themselves to the possibility of such enjoyment
of forms strange to them. The idea of the true church here given '
is not realized therefore in one single instance, but, ‘as has been
indicated on p. 154, by the peaceful cosmopolitan union of all existing
communions, each being as perfect as possible after its own manner.

192 FOURTH SPEECH.

This idea, belonging as it does to the completion of human nature,
must be developed more fully in the science of ethics. Two objections
to it, however, may be easily set aside. First, how does this agree
with the call attributed to Christianity in the “ Glaubenslehre” to
absorb all other kinds of faith, for were all one, that cosmopolitan
union for communicating and for understanding different faiths would
not exist. But this has already been answered. All naturally
existing different characteristics in Christianity would not disappear,
but would always develope itself in a subordinate way, without
injury to its higher unity. At present Christianity exhibits no
outward unity, and the highest we can wish to see is just sucha
peaceful union of its various types. We have no reason to believe
that it will ever exhibit an outward unity, but, even if it did, it would
still be such a cosmopolitan union. But, secondly, can it be said that
what is here called the true church has ever actually existed in any
one instance? When the Apostles of Christ scattered to preach the
Gospel and break bread in the houses and the schools, they exercised
the priestly office among the laity in the visible church, and when
they were by themselves in the upper-room to praise God and the
Lord, what were they but that true church? In this Speech also it
is pointed out not indistinctly (p. 165), that this kind of existence has
been always renewed and has never quite vanished from the true
church. And, certainly, if there has ever been any one instance of
the true church it wasthen. But something was wanting, something
held in this Speech to be essential to the true church, greatness and
majesty of presentation. This consciousness of inadequacy was,
humanly speaking, among the motives for the wider expansion of
Christianity. Yet this instanee, despite its short continuance,
showed that the imperfect church only springs from the perfect.
But having once disappeared, the enormous expansive power of
Christianity made its reappearance impossible, and the true church
can never again be found except in that cosmopolitan union.

The highest spiritual communion of the most perfect saints is
thus conditioned by the communion of the more perfect with the
less perfect. But if this latter communion is of a better type, and
can be the only foundation for the former, doesit deserve the re-
proach that only inquirers enter it, and only those who are not yet
pious stay in itP This may still be said, only not asa reproach.
All who enter, and not only the more receptive and imperfect, seek
some one to inspire and encourage them, but the more advanced
also seek helpers for such a presentation as can be recognized as
proceeding from the spirit of the true church. Through this common

EXPLANATIONS. 193

work they seek advancement in outward mastery as well as inward
power and truth. Hence none of the members of the church have
attained, they are only attaining. But if to this combination in its
best form, a combination of the perfect be opposed who seek nothing
beyond the joy of contemplation, because everyone is already what
he can be, this can be nothing but just that cosmopolitan union.
In it everyone is valued simply according to his present state and
attainments, and cannot expect to be immediately forwarded in his
own peculiar sphere by contemplating extraneous things. But if
the description of the true church were the immediate association of
the more perfect, it would need to be understood literally of the
church triumphant, for only in it can an absolutely mutual com-
munion that is without inequality and without progress, be thought
of. There, on the contrary, there is only so much of the true church
as there is true life and reproductive development in the existing
religious communions. |

(12) Page 160.—Two reproaches are made here against the present
regulation of the church. The former evil has doubtless caused far
more confusion at various times, but the latter has always given me
a painful feeling of the undeveloped state of the society. I mean
the regulation, that for our holiest symbol, the Lord’s supper, though
it is, in most larger communions at least, in the most natural way,
the crown of each service, previous meditation and preparation are
required on each occasion from the participants. Clearly no one
will deny that it would be the finest effect of the whole service, if
very many present were attuned for celebrating this sacred meal.
But this fairest blossom of devoutness is lost. How often, on the
other hand, with all previous meditation and preparation, inward
and outward disturbance may enter, and diminish the full blessing.
Now just because of the previous preparation it may not be easy to
put off the participation. Is not this way of doing a speaking proof
of how little influence upon the heart we believe the matter itself
to be capable, and how we treat all Christians, without exception, as
unreliable novices? It will be a happy time when we dare to cast
aside this caution and welcome tothe table of the Lord everyone
whom a momentary impulse conducts thither... . Still more
confusion, however, arises from the other misunderstanding here
mentioned, which is that not only do the clergy among themselves
estimate themselves by the standard of a creed, but the laity also
presume to deliver judgment on the clergy by the same standard.
Nay; a right is acknowledged in the congregation to require that
their clergy shall teach them according to the letter of the creed.

O

194 FOURTH SPEECH.

In other matters, if anything is prepared for my use I must be
allowed, if I will, to determine myself how it shall be prepared, seeing
I alone can rightly judge of my necessity. It is, however, quite
otherwise with doctrine, for, if Iam in a position to judge howa
doctrine on any subject is to be set forth if it is to be useful to me,
I do not require teaching, but can myself give it, or at most I require
to be reminded. This claim, therefore, is the more preposterous the
sharper the line is drawn between clergy and laity. Were all on the
same level, indeed, it might be easier to suppose an agreement to
abide by a common type. Itis also the more absurd the more the
teaching of the clergy is, as, God be thanked, it still is everywhere
in the Evangelical Church a free outpouring of the heart, and the
chief worth is not set on the repetition of fixed formularies as
in the Romish or Greek Churches. If the laity, whether singly as
patrons of a church or congregation, or combined as state officials,
or as a congregation, decide what accords with the letter of the creed,
and how far its authority is to apply to the teaching, it is peculiarly
preposterous. The letter of the creed has had its sole origin with
the clergy, who certainly did not wish to be themselves limited by it
in their dealings with the laity. The laity are only through the
instruction of the clergy even in a position to understand the letter
of the creed. This preposterousness appears at its height when the
head of a state personally believes he has by his position justification
and qualification for deciding on the creed of another communion,
when he believes he can judge of the relation of the clergy to it and
what religious communications, the religiousness of which is quite
strange to him, may tend to forward its interests. The Chinese
Emperor, for example, tolerates Christianity, but provides through
his mandarins that no party swerve from its own creed. There is,
however, one consolation, that on this point there can be nothing but
improvement.

(13) Page 161.—This state of things is, in many respects, most pro-
minent in the Romish and Greek Churches. Nor is it merely because
the distinction between priest and Jaity is there most pronounced.
The clergy are not limited to the duty in the congregations; only
for the secular clergy is this the chief concern. For the others it is
only secondary. First of all they are to live in high religious con-
templation. The clergy thus in their inward association form the true
church. The laity are simply those who by them have been formed
to piety, and who therefore stand under continual spiritual guidance,
while the highest triumph is for some to become capable of reception
into that closer sphere of the religious life. That the principle of

EXPLANATIONS. 195

this theory exists in the Catholic Church we should have to acknow-
ledge, even though, in other respects, the most glaring opposition
between the two classes had not again appeared. And I do not rest
on the imperfect result, on the bad state of the clergy, on the irreli-
gious vacuity of the cloister life. In that case we could only say at
most that the attempt to present the true church, separate from
those who are only being taught in religion, has not succeeded. The
chief point is that the failure is based in the principle. In practice
the clergy and monastics are often deeply involved in all worldly
matters, but, according to the idea, the contemplative life is quite
separated from the active, the latter being declared quite incom-
patible with the higher religious stage. Judging the consequences
from all that has hitherto taken place, it is not to be doubted that
Protestantism is, in this regard, a return to the right way of pre-
senting the true church, and that-it bears more also of its image.
(14) Page 161.—A misunderstanding is here easily possible, as if
systematic theology had its only source in the corruption of religion.
Elsewhere I have plainly enough declared that, so soon as any religion
attains any greatness, it must construct for itself a theology, of which
system—an exhibition of the closest connection of the religious princi-
ples and dogmas—has been and must remain a natural and essential
part. But here I speak only of the false interest taken often by the
whole church in the connection of doctrine. Clearly this is based
only on that corruption. The system as a whole and in its sections,
which can only be fully understood in connection with the whole,
should remain the exclusive possession of those who in this parti-
cular respect have had a scientific training. It is their concern,
because on the one side it enables them to scan the whole circum-
ference of possible subjects of religious communication and presenta-
tion, and to assign each its place, and on the other it serves as a
critical norm for testing all religious utterances by the precise
expression, whereby it is easier to discover whether anything that
cannot be reduced to this expression is mere confusion or conceals
something contrary to the spirit of the whole. As both interests lie
quite outside the horizon of all the other members of the church, they
should not be affected by anything exclusively bearing on them. If
there is anything in the public or social utterance that immediately
injures their pious consciousness, they have no need of further
witness from any system. But if they can be injured by what is
contained only in scientific terminology, then this is just that cor-
ruption here shown, whether they have lost themselves in unseemly
conceit of wisdom, or are called in blind zeal by theological dispu-

o 2

196 FOURTH SPEECH.

tants to help in crushing some dangerous man. How beautiful
would it be if theologians would begin the change and warn the laity
of all kinds against all participation in dogmatic strifes, and point
them to the good belief that there are pious theologians enough to
arrange the matter.

(15) Page 162.—This is easy to correct from the preceding dr
tions. If what is here called the true church has no separate
manifestation, neither is there, in a literal sense, a passing sojourn
in the actually existing communion. Exclusiveness alone is
passing, so that outside of his own communion everyone advanced in
piety may be also capable in a certain sense of sharing in the cosmo-
politan union of all. Similarly the word decisive is not to be taken
literally as if the incapable should be quite outside of all religious
fellowship, either being put out or keeping out. This the pious
neither could nor should do, nor even suffer to be done. Since they
seek to give their presentations of religion the widest and deepest
influence, they can let no one depart. Still less can they exclude,
for an absolute incapacity can never be acknowledged. They must
always look for a time when an element common to all men shall be
developed, and for some yet untried art that may favour its develop-
ment. Yet it remains true that the person in whom religiousness,
in the form nearest and most congenial to him, is awakened only
after such long and painful effort can hardly attain that higher
development and free enjoyment.

(16) Page 166.—A great preference is here exhibited for the smaller
communions as against the great ecclesiastical institutions. One side
only doubtless is brought into prominence. This is difficult to avoid,
at least in an oratorical connection, when attention has to be drawn to
an utterly neglected or greatly depreciated subject. The preference,
however, rests on the following reasons. First, on the greater
variety that can be manifested in the same time and space. In the
great bodies either no variety is allowed to grow, or it is hidden, or
discoverable only by close observers. In the religious sphere, more-
over, more than anywhere else, points of union arise which cannot
long continue, but which, though fleeting, may produce something
strong and characteristic. If now only great church institutions
exist, these germs are all lost, or at least reach no clear and com-
plete organization. The other leading reason is, that the smaller
ecclesiastical societies, because they awake less apprehension, are
freer, and are less seldom put in wardship by the civil authority.
When I first wrote this, America seemed to me a marvellously active
theatre, where everything took this shape, and where, in conse-

Zu oes

EXPLANATIONS. 197

quence, I thought that, more than anywhere else, our own beloved
Fatherland not excepted, the freedom of the religious life and of
the religious society was assured. Since then the development has
confirmed the anticipation. Unions are freely made and dissolved.
They divide themselves. Smaller parts separate from a greater
whole, and smaller wholes draw together. Thus they seek a
centre around which to form a greater unity. The freedom of
Christian development is so great that many communions, as the
Unitarian, would appear to us, I believe wrongly, outside of
Christianity. In such a breaking up of Christianity there might be
a fear that it would gradually lose its great historical form, and its
scientific stability come to be quite forgotten. But the prospect is
better since science hasadvanced and institutions have been founded
for the propagation of Christian learning. Only one thing is to be
lamented—at least so it appears to us from the distance—the
British spirit has so much taken the upper hand and the German
keeps on receding. For those free states, therefore, such a German
immigration as would establish an abiding influence, were to be
wished. . . . Now, however, that I have been more weaned from the
smaller society and have grown more into the larger institution I
would not speak so decisively. In England, for example, it is most
evident that it would stand ill with Christianity, either if the Epis-
copal Church were quite dissolved and scattered among the smaller
societies, or if it absorbed them all and existed alone. Similarly we
must conclude that if the religious life in its whole variety and ful-
ness would develope in the broad compass of Christianity, both great
institutions and small societies must exist together as they have
almost always done, so that the institution must be resolved into
small societies and from them be again produced. Disorganizing
elements it must surrender to them, and from them again it must be
_ enriched and strengthened. After this exposition of the matter, no
one will ask how this preference for smaller religious societies is con-
sistent with a lively participation in the union of the two Protestant
ecclesiastical societies, that would not only make one greater out of
two smaller, but manifestly cause the smaller at least to disappear.
The following alone I would add. The difference of doctrine has
always appeared to me insignificant, but there has manifestly been
a difference of spirit between the two communions. Without that,
such a division could not have arisen from motives otherwise so in-
significant. This difference has not yet by any means quite disap-
peared. Now this involves onesidedness on the part of both, and the
time now appears to be come for a more vigorous effort to diminish

198 FOURTH SPEECH.

these limitations by complete combination of differences and by
friendly proximity. This could better be accomplished by union, by
a life in freedom more bound and in the bonds more free. Besides, it
seemed high time to provide that a recurrence of envy between the
two might not render impossible the strong resistance which is.
becoming necessary against the manifold suspicious endeavours of
the Romish Church.

(17) Page 166.—A person who has spoken as urgently as I have done

“in the fourth collection of my sermons for once moremaking the whole

care of the poor a business of the ecclesiastical association, appears to
know quite well to what all property and money endowments might
be devoted. But even the most extensive care of the poor requires
only a secure yearly income. Wherefore, if the congregational tie is
secure, and the spirit that rules in it embraces an active goodwill for
this subject, this business also can be carried on satisfactorily without
any such possession. Other things being equal, it will, indeed, be
carried on better. On the one side all capital can be better used by
private people, and on the other this possession adds a foreign element
to the pure character of a congregation and introduces an estimate
of its members other than the purely religious.

(18) Page 169.—By this complaint I in nowise meant that the state
should not in many and in most important things rely chiefly on
the power of the religious sentiments and on the agreement of its
own interests with their natural working. But I meant that in so
far as it believes it must so rely, it is to be desired that the state
do not interfere in a manner hurtful to the pure effect of these
sentiments. Now this happens without fail, when there is any
positive intermeddling. The state may on the one side assume the
religious sentiment of its members and rejoice confidingly in its
working. It then reserves the right to withdraw this assumption in
respect of an individual who does not manifest this working, or when
this deficiency shows itself in a decisive majority of a religious
society, it inquires how far the defect has its root in the principles
of the society and modifies its assumption accordingly. But so long
as it has no ground for withdrawing its trust, it must know that the
organization of the society proceeds from the very sentiment, from
which it expects good result, and that in the nature of the case
only those in whom this sentiment is strongest will have most
influence in forming and guiding the society. It must, therefore,
leave the sentiment free to operate, allowing the organization of
the society to take its own course without its guidance. This must
dontinue till the result gives ground for lessening the state’s confi-

ee nn - ' —re

EXPLANATIONS. 199

dence. If astate has this confidence only in one particular form of
religiousness, it follows this course with the society in’ which it exists,
and regulates its conduct towards the others by the greatness of its
distrust, varying up to complete intolerance. A state relies on one
religious society and accords it a high degree of independence;
another it watches more closely, and itself decides on its organization.
Now in reason this can have no other ground than that the state
gives the latter society less confidence. A marvellous phenomenon
cannot be thought of, as if a state would watch more closely the
religious society to which the sovereign himself belonged and limit it
in its free activity more than any other. This case of confidence
in the religious sentiment is, for ourpresent inquiry, the first
point. The second is the opposite case, when the state looks
for no good effect in respect of anything falling within its own
sphere from the religious sentiment of its members. Even then
there seems to. be no consistent course, except to allow religion to
manifest itself as an amusement to which the state is indifferent,
taking care, as with other private associations, that no harm arises
to the civil community. Applying this now to education, the matter
here in discussion and the matter to which everything comes back,
there seem to be the following consequences. The religious edu-
cation of man will never, as such, be the whole education of man
All training in which the religious society does not, as such, interest
itself, as for example the academic and higher scientific, lies outside
_ of its domain. Perhaps the church has earlier thought of education
than the state. The state will then say, “I see that you have the
institutions for educating the youth, but they do not suffice me. I
will add what fails but will then take them under my guidance.” If
the church dares to speak and understands its own good, it will
reply, “ Not so, but for all deficiency make your own institutions and
we, as citizens, will honourably contribute our utmost to their suc-
cess. Within our special limits, however, leave us our own to care
for ourselves, and only omit from yours that for which you think
ours will suffice.” Does the state, nevertheless, do by force the
contrary, there will be an element in the highest degree undesirable
to the church, and it will feel it an injury even when this gives the
doubtful privilege of a certain influence on many things whereon, by
the natural course of things, it would have none. . . With the teaching
of human duties in civil life, which is nothing but a continuous
education of grown-up people, it is the same. That this is needed
by the state admits of no doubt, all the more if it does not proceed
naturally from the public life. ‘The state finds now that there iR

ae ee he ket Ae

neon, eae ap ee NS a Te a -_-~

200 | FOURTH SPEECH.

teaching of this kind in the exereises and utterances of the religious
society existing’ in its midst. It willingly resolves to spare an
institution of its own for this object. The religious society is
pleased to render this service to the common good. But the
state says, “I will make use of your teaching, but to make

sure that it completely reaches my purpose, I must prescribe to

you what you are not to forget to speak of, and what you shall recall
from history at fixed times, and I must make arrangements to know
that this is actually done.” The church will then, if it dare,
certainly say, “ By no means, for there would then be much teaching
not belonging to our department, and in respect of history it is
repugnant to us, for example, to recall joyfully certain days when you
were victorious over another state, while our society in that state
must observe a discreet silence, and should rejoice on other days
when you were defeated, and which we again must pass over. Both
days are alike to us, and we must, in our own way, make the same
use both of what is to your honour and toyour shame. With this use
you may well be content, but for that special purpose make another
arrangement, for we cannot assist.” And if the state gives no heed
to these representations, it injures the personal freedom of its
members where it is holiest and most inviolable. ... The third
matter here mentioned, the taking of oaths, properly belongs to the
second, but is specially mentioned because of the special manner in
which the state brings the church to its aid. An injury has here
also been inflicted. The different small societies of non-swearers are
allowed a simple affirmation instead of an oath, but the great
church, specially favoured by the state, is exhorted to preach on the
sacredness of oaths, and its members must take them in the pre-
scribed manner or lose all the privileges involved. There may,
however, be many among them who, fearing the plain prohibition of
Christ, are troubled in conscience about swearing, and among the
teachers there may also be many who cannot get over the literal inter-
pretation of those words, and who think it irreligious to come to the
help of the state in sucha manner. How can it be that such an injury
to religious freedom should not be felt very painfully ? These fuller
explanations, it is to be hoped, will justify the wish expressed in the
text, that the state should employ what is useful to it in the ar-
rangements of the church only in so far as consists with uninjured
freedom.

(19) Page 269.—Of the three points here lamented, two are only
burdensome because they witness to the dependence of the church »

or the state. The sacred acts of baptism and solemnization

— m OL mn m mn -—

rt Geet rt cat a

EXPLANATIONS. 201

of marriage are made to appear as done by the clergy, first of all, as
servants of the state, in the name of the state. Without question
this is one reason why the way they are carried out, betrays so little
of a Christian or indeed of a religious character. If inscription in
the civil register were a purely civil act, no one could regard
baptism as merely a legal formality, accompanied occasionally by a
stately speech. And if the marriage contract were first concluded
purely civilly, and the blessing of the church were purely an act of
the members of a congregation, it would soon appear that marriages
are best where a special value is set on this additional outward con-
secration. But the worst is, the point between. An Evangelical
Christian state unites many civil qualifications with admission to
the sacrament. In many instances it demands attestations of this
act. It acts with the best intention towards the youth, seeking to
guard them against the religious negligence of their parents or
guardians. But how much are the consciences of pious clergymen
burdened; how often must they, quite against their conviction,
declare religious instruction and closer supervision at an end. Even
were a great number of baptized Christians to remain all their lives
without participation in the other sacrament, as is the case in North
America, it does not appear that this would be a misfortune.
Rather it would have the advantage that the Christian church
would not appear responsible for the lives of the grossest men, while
the strife about the right of exclusion from the congregation would
be spared. In Protestant Europe only the grossest would be outside,
for the continued participation in divine service would sooner or
later supply what they had lost at that time when confirmation
usually takes place. As in the American free states it might
furthermore happen with us that the children of Christian parents,
who set no great store on the fellowship of the church, would remain
unbaptized. They would then have no link with the church. This
might well happen, though with us such an anti-Christian zealotism
would be very rare. But to hinder the real loss that would hence
arise, the state should not be required to impose baptism by force,
but it should begin early to protect the freedom of conscience of the
children even against the parents. These complaints appear plainly
capable of remedy, but only by a great difference of form in all those
concerns that relate to the connection of church and state. If the
example of the free states in the other hemisphere alone were
considered, and everything in the condition of the church charged
as consequences of what is here postulated, it would unquestionably
be unfair. There are these imperfections inseparable from a young

202 FOURTH SPEECH.

and very dissimilar population that have been gathered from all
quarters, which will be thrown off without the necessity of essential
change in these matters.

(20) Page 170.—That in all religious doings the predominance of
legal or civil relations is a departure from the original nature of the
matter, especially if it occasions pecuniary transactions between the
clergy and the members of the congregation, requires no further
discussion. Yet it appears as if this complaint would never be
removed so long as a state, as such, confesses its adherence to any one
religious society, or even if it believes it can require all its members
to belong to some society. In the former case, if a law declares that
only in one church is there the greatest fulness of that sentiment
which can maintain this state and be the fullest security against all
its possible foes, it would follow that the whole maintenance of the
state would be entrusted only to the members of this society. In the
present state of social relations this can only continue as a law where
the great body of the people belong to that society, the rest being only
clients and strangers. But even in Catholic countries such a state
of matters no longer exists, and it does not seem as if, in the present
position of affairs, a state would easily be able to confess absolute
and undivided adherence to one religious society. The south Euro-
pean states, which have anew proclaimed the Catholic religion to be
the religion of the state, will not, even though their position is
favourable and Protestants are only found scattered as clients, be
able for many generations of tranquillity to adhere without harshness
and injustice to this system. It is quite different when, without
law and in consequence of the natural effect of public opinion, all
that is essential in the government of the state falls to the adherents
of one society. Such a transaction is not a state’s confession, and —
we must wish that it may long continue. But if adherence to one
society is now a passing state of things, is it a right maxim for the
state, without deciding which, to require that its citizens belong to
some one? Let it be granted that irreligious men are neither
profitable for the civil union, nor to be relied upon. But would they
be made religious by being compelled to confess adherence to any
one religious society? Manifestly the only way to make irreligious
men really religious is to strengthen the influence of religious men
upon them as much as possible. For this end the state cannot work
more effectively than by allowing all the religious societies within its
domain to operate with the fullest freedom. This freedom they will
never feel till those intermeddlings cease.

(21) Page 172.—With this exposition, which rests on a very meagre

ek nn pe endl

EXPLANATIONS. 203

experience, I can no longer agree. And first, in respect of capabili-
ties, it appears as if the people and the cultured would have a very
unequal enjoyment of a religious utterance on which, according to
the demands made above, all the flowers of speech are to be expended.
But all true eloquence must be popular throughout. It is affecta-
tion that chooses either expressions or combinations of thought
unsuited to the majority, and the cultured also must be capable of
guidance by a thoroughly popular diction. A division of hearers in
respect of capacity is not required by the nature of the subject, but
by the consciousness of imperfection in the artists. It is only a
different kind of imperfection when one man speaks better for the
people and another for the higher ranks. But in the second
place, in respect of mental type, it is indeed not to be denied that
the differences of the audience must be contained in very narrow
limits, if a religious utterance is to have a large and happy result.
But it must be a wrong assumption, that in a multitude united in
other matters and woven together in a common life, we must have
very different religious peculiarities, and indeed so marvellously
different that on the one side they are not strong enough to form a
religious society of their own, and on the other they are so markedly
singular that they cannot appropriate a religious utterance of
another type. Only in great cities could elements so different be
brought into a small compass, and here every one has an easy choice,
selecting the presentations of religion that can strengthen and
quicken him. But suppose the people are considered in relation to
the different forms of religion afterwards mentioned. It will always
be found that in whole districts, through many generations, the
religious life has been prevailingly mystic, or more linked to history,
or influenced by understanding and reflection. Exceptions are rare,
and those who are not religious according to the dominant type are
less religious altogether. If, therefore, the easy selection of the gay
world in great cities were not troubled by narrow partiality for the
ministrants, and on the other hand all religious orators strove only
after true popularity, on this point, at, least, our present state would
be tolerable enough.
(22) Page 174.—That the state, besides what it confides to the
church, must provide an educational institution of its own, be it for
the younger generation or for the less educated portion of the people,
is here regarded as absolutely necessary. This contention shows the
speaker’s decision onthe much discussed question of therelation of state
and church to what in the widest sense of the word is called school.
In part the state may continue to rely on the religious associations.

204 FOURTH SPEECH.

Yet it must be content to exercise only a negative supervision over
their institutions. For the rest it is the duty of the state to arrange
and care. Where there is any kind of religious association, that the
awaking of the higher spiritual be not hindered, there is also in the
homes a uniform discipline for taming sensuality, which is in every
way useful for the civil life. But if the state requires a special dis-
cipline to produce certain habits in its citizens suited to the time, it
must not come from the church. The proper feeling of its necessity
being universally diffused, the state may rely on the work of the
families, not as elements of the religious but of the civil society. If
this feeling is not sufficiently diffused, the state must make public
provision. All that is academic in education is of this kind, for it
cannot and, being quite foreign to it, should not even appear to pro-
ceed from the church. Further, wherever a system of religious
communication exists, there must be common instruction of the youth
in all that bears upon understanding the religious speech and the _
creed. This is properly the church parish school. In Christendom
it is for transmitting religious ideas, and among Protestants for
some small understanding at least of the Scriptures. Has the state
confidence that an effective communication of moral ideas and the
germs of mental development will be given at the same time, it may
rely on the church school for those objects. But everything statis-
tical, mathematical, technical and such like is foreign to the church
school. Ifthe ecclesiastical and the civil community are identical, the
ecclesiastical and the civil school may for some good reason be
united in one institution. But the state no more acquires the right
thereby to conduct the ecclesiastical school, than the church to con-
duct the civil. Finally, every religious fellowship that has a history
requiring, for comprehending its development, attainments that
belong to the sphere of science and learning, needs an institution to
maintain and encourage such attainments. This is the church
academy. All other sciences are foreign to the church. Suppose
there exist in the state, either being maintained by the state or
being independent bodies, academies for general science, and suppose
the church has confidence that their methods are suited to its re-
quirements, it may find it expedient to unite with them its own
special academy. But the expediency must be determined by the
church, and neither by the state nor by the scientific bodies. The
church may neither found a claim on this union to general super-
intendence of scientific institutions, nor give up its right to
manage its own academy. These are the principles then on which
church and state are to act together or act apart. But to acknow-

AO eS SEP OG FLOOR EL

EXPLANATIONS. 205

ledge these principles towards one church and not towards another
is the worst possible inconsistency. It must necessarily pain the
slighted church that incurable disagreement should arise between
their religious and their political feeling. .

(23) Page 174.— Well said of every such relation ! and in this view I
still standfirm. Nay, I stand firmer, the more lamentable complica-
tions I see arising from this dependence of the church on the state.
These complications were less thought of then, for the only thing of
the kind so rapidly came to grief on the dominant tendency of the time.
“ Yet itis impossible that the church should be without any union
with the state. That appears even where the church is freest. The
least is that the state treat the religious societies like any other
private society. As a general principle of association it takes know-
ledge of them and puts itself in a position to-interfere in case they
should cherish anything prejudicial to the common freedom and
safety. With this least, however, it is seldom possible to escape, as
appears even in North America where the church is freest. The
freer the churches are the easier it happens that some dissolve and
some combine. Now even though they may have no possessions except
the most absolutely necessary means for meeting together, there are
difficulties of settlement in which the state is the natural arranger
and umpire. Had this and no other relation existed between church
and state at the time of the Reformation, the present curious position
of affairs would not have come to pass, that in lands almost entirely
Protestant the Catholic Church is well endowed and secured, while
the Evangelical Church is referred to a changeable and often doubt-
ful good will. Every further union of church and state should be
regarded as a private agreement for the time being. The more
of these transactions there are the more it will seem that a church-
communion in one state becomes the church of the land, and
becomes more divided from its brethren in the faith in other states.
The less there are, the more a communion, though spread over many
states, may appear an undivided whole, and the more marked is
the independence of the church from the state. Within these
limits, all existing relations are permissible, and it belongs to com-
pleteness that at some time and place they have all had historical
existence. On the contrary, what transcends these limits is of evil.

(24) Page 174.—This rejection of all closer connection among the
congregations of the same faith and of all religious associations, rests
solely on the presupposition that every existing church is only a
visible appendage of the true church. It is, therefore, right, only in
so far as the presupposition is right. Since I wrote this I have

206 FOURTH SPEECH.

shown myself a zealous defender of synodal government which is
manifestly included in this rejection. In part I have abandoned
the presupposition, By observation and joyful experience I have
reached the conviction that truly believing and pious persons exist
in adequate number in our congregations, and thatit is good to
strengthen as much as possible their influence on the rest. This
result naturally flows from well-ordered combinations. In part
also, life in our time soon conducts to the view that every improve-
ment that is to succeed must be ushered in from all sides at once.
This involves that men should in many respects be treated as if
they already were what they ought to be. Otherwise it would be
necessary to wait on and on and no beginning would be possible.
But according to my view the sole warrant for such closer combina-
tions is that the participators are members of the true church, in
which the distinction between priests and laity is only to serve the
occasion and cannot be permanent. Wherefore, I could only defend
a constitution that rested on this equality and any other in the
Evangelical Church there could never be. Where synodal unions
consist purely of the clergy, they seem either by the state commis-
sion and purely consultative, or literary and friendly, rather than
ecclesiastical, and constitutional. A constitutional priestly govern-
ment becomes only the Catholic Church. The foundation stone of
that church is the higher personal religious worth of the priests, and
its first principle that the laity, only by their mediation, enjoy
their share in the blessings of the church. The last assertion
ventured in this passage, that there should be no outward bond
between teachers and congregation, depends still more on the
presupposition that the congregation still require to be led to
religion. This could only be done on condition of the most complete
spontaneousness. Who is then to impose this outward bond ?
Neither the state nor a corporation of the clergy, if this spontaneous-
ness is to exist. The congregations cannot, for they cannot judge of
those who must first communicate to them the ability to judge the
worth in question. Hence this bond can only be entered on and
upheld where the spirit of piety in the congregations can be assumed,
and where those who can guide and limit this judgment are re-
garded as having come forth from the congregation. Herein are
contained the principles for determining in different circumstances
the firmness or the freedom of the bond.:

(25) Page 175.—On the limits of the binding power {exercised by
creeds, I have lately declared myself more fully, though with special
reference to the Evangelical Church. I here call this bond unholy

EXPLANATIONS. 207

when it is regarded in the ordinary way, and I am still of this
opinion. Than unbelief nothing is more unholy to the pious. Of
unbelief an abundance underlies the maxim that teachers of
religion, and even teachers of theology, should be bound by the letter
of a written confession. It is unbelief in the power of the common
spirit in the church, when men are not convinced that alien elements
in individuals will not, by the living power of the whole, be either
assimilated or enveloped and made harmless, but believe external
force is required to cast it out. Itis unbelief in the power of the
word of Christ and of the Spirit that declares Him, when men do not
believe that every time has naturally its own fitting interpretation
and application ofit, when they believe we must adhere to the pro-
duction ofanother age. It can never again befall us that the spirit
of prophesy should become dumb. The Sacred Scripture itself has
obtained its position, and will retain it only by the power of free
belief and not by outward sanction.

(26) Page 176.—The feeling that ecclesiastical matters as they then
existed in the greater part of Germany, and still exist, little altered,
could not continue as they were, has since become much more general
and definite. Yet how the matter will turn is still not much clearer.
This alone can be foreseen, that if an Evangelical Church is not soon
putin a position in which a fresher public spirit can be developed in it,
and if the restrictive treatment of our universities and our open
spiritual intercourse is longer continued, the hopes we cherished will
be fruitless blossom, and the fair dawn of the recent time has only
betokened storm. Living piety and liberal courage will ever more
and more disappear from the clerical order. Dominion of the dead
letter from aboveand uneasy spiritless sectarianism from below will
approach. From their collision a whirlwind will arise that will drive
many helpless souls into the outstretched net of Jesuitism, and
deaden and weary the great masses to utter indifference. The signs
that proclaim this are clear enough ; but everyone should on every
occasion declare that he sees them as a testimony against those who
heed them not.

(27) Page 178.—This limitation will seem to many too narrow. A
profound and extensive cultivation of the mind, and a rich inward ex-
perience may very well exist where the theological erudition, that is the
- essential condition of the office of church teacher, is wanting. Should
such gifts be limited in their religious working to the narrow circle of
the domestic life? Could not and should not such men, even when
they cannot leadin public religious assemblies, yet work by the living
word in freer, wider circles? Should not the enormous influence

ee FOURTH SPEECH.

which they can obtain through the written word be pointed out to
them? To this I have a twofold answer. First, all that, as free
sociableness, most resembles the family connection, links itself
naturally to the domestic life. The work of exhibiting there the
character of a liberal-minded religious life is not insignificant. It
is a duty hitherto neither sufficiently understood nor sufficiently
exercised. If it were, there could not possibly be such a marked
contrast in a great part of Germany, particularly among the higher
and more refined circles, between the interest taken in religious
formulas and theological disputes, and the domestic and social life
in which no trace of a decisive religious character appears. Here,
then, is a great sphere for the pious sense. But larger assemblies,
exceeding the limits and the nature of the social life, yet not aiming
at forming a congregation, in short conventicles, are always miserable
half and between affairs, that have never contributed much to the
advancement of religion, but have rather produced and cherished
what is morbid. Secondly, in respect of religious influence by the
written word, it would certainly be a great evil if the clerical order
were to possess a monopoly. Nay, it does not seem to me consistent
with the spirit of the Evangelical Church, that they should exercise
a generalcensorship. But while there should be the greatest freedom,
it is an entirely different question whether everyone should venture
to communicate his religious views and sentiments in this way; and
whether it would be expedient that it should happen often is very
much to be doubted. The harm from the flood of mediocre romances
and children’s books may very well be compared with the harm from
the mass of mediocre religious writings. Nay, they are manifestly a
desecration, which the former are not. Even superior talent falls
more easily into mediocrity, for what is to have attraction and effect
is the subjective apprehension of universally known objects and
relations. Only a high degree of unaffected originality, or a true
inspiration, coming from the inmost depths of a reflective mind,
or from the stimulating power of a life, nobly active, can succeed.
Otherwise there can be nothing but mediocrity. With religious
songs, indeed, it is different. Among us a large proportion of them
has been composed by laymen of all classes. Many that a severe
judge would call only mediocre, have passed into church use, and
have attained thereby a kind of immortality. Two circumstances
assist. First, every hymn book has only a very limited sphere, and
here much may be good that has not all the qualities demanded by
absolute publicity. Many of those productions would doubtless have
long perished, and been forgotten, had they required to maintain

EXPLANATIONS. 209

themselves as pure literary works. Secondly, in the public use of
hymns so many other things assist. The author does not produce
the effect alone. He is supported by the composer by whom, more
or less, everything that has the same metre and is known to all
has harmony and effect; he is supported by the congregation who
put their piety into the execution, and by the liturgies that assign
the work of the poet its right place in a larger connection.

FIFTH SPEECH.

THE RELIGIONS.

Man in closest fellowship with the highest must be for you
all an object of esteem, nay, of reverence. No one capable
of understanding such a state can, when he sees it, with-
hold this feeling. That is past all doubt. You may
despise all whose minds are easily and entirely filled with
trivial things, but in vain you attempt to depreciate one
who drinks in the greatest for his nourishment. You may
love him or hate him, according as he goes with you or
against you in the narrow path of activity and culture, but
even the’ most beautiful feeling of equality you cannot
entertain towards a person so far exalted above you. The
seeker for the Highest Existence in the world stands above
all who have not a like purpose. Your wisest men say
that, even against your will, you must honour the virtuous
who, in accordance with the laws of the moral nature,
endeavour to determine finite concerns by infinite require-
ments. And were it even possible for you to find some-

thing ridiculous in virtue itself, because of the contrast
between the limited powers and the infinite undertaking,
you still could not deny esteem to one whose organs are
open to the Universe, who is far from strife and opposition,
exalted above all imperfect endeavour, responsive to the
Universe and one withit. You cannot despise when you
see man in this supreme moment of human existence and
the clear beam is reflected in its purity upon you.

THE RELIGIONS. 211

But whether the picture of the nature and of the life of
‚religion I have drawn has claimed your esteem I do not
inquire. Because of false conceptions and devotion to non-
essentials esteem is too often refused, but I am sure of the
power of the subject, as soon as it is freed from its distort-
ing drapery. Nor do I ask whether my thoughts on the
coherence of this indwelling capacity with all that is sublime
and godlike in our nature, have stimulated you to an
intenser study of our nature and possibilities. I also pass
the question, whether you have taken the higher stand-
point I showed you, and have recognized from thence, in
that nobler fellowship of spirits, so much misjudged,
wherein everyone freely surrenders himself, not regarding
the glory of his self-will, nor the exclusive possession of his
deepest, most secret individuality, that he may regard
himself as a work of the eternal, the all-fashioning World-
Spirit, even the holy of holies of fellowship, higher far than
any earthly fellowship, holier than the tenderest tie of
friendship. In short, I do not ask whether all religion, in
its infinity, its divine power, has compelled you to adoration,
for I leave the matter itself to work upon you.

At present I have something else to deal with, a new
opposition to vanquish. I would, as it were, conduct you
to the God that has become flesh; I would show you .
religion when it has resigned its infinity and appeared,
often in sorry form, among men; I would have you dis-
cover religion in the religions. Though they are always
earthly and impure, the same form of heavenly beauty that
I have tried to depict is to be sought in them. |

The divisions of the church and the difference of re-
ligion are almost always found together. The connection
seems inseparable. There are as many creeds and con-
fessions as churches and religious communions. Glancing
at this state of things, you might easily believe that my
judgment on the plurality of the church must also be my
judgment on the plurality of religion. You would, how-

P 2

212 FIFTH SPEECH.

ever, entirely mistake my opinion. I condemned the
plurality of the church, but my argument presupposed the
plurality of religion. I showed from the nature of the case
that in the church all rigid outline should be lost, that all
distinct partition should disappear, Not only did I hold
that all should be one indivisible whole in spirit and sym-
pathy, but that the actual connection should have larger
development and ever approach the highest, the universal
unity. Now if there is not everywhere plurality of religion,
if the most marked difference is not necessary and un-
avoidable, why should the true church need to be one? Is
it not that everyone in the religion of others may see and
share what he cannot find in hisown? And why should
the visible church be only one, if it is not that everyone
may seek in it religion in the form best fitted to awake
the germ that lies asleep in him? And if this germ can
only be fertilized and made to grow by one definite kind of
influence, it must itself be of a definite kind.

Nor can these different manifestations of religion be
mere component parts, differing only in number and size,
and forming, when combined, a uniform whole. In that
case every one would by natural'progress come to be like his
neighbour. Such religion as he acquired would change
- into his own, and become identical with it. The church,
this fellowship with all believers which I consider indis-
pensable for every religious man, would be merely pro-
visional. The more successful its work, the quicker would
it end—a view of the institution I have never contemplated.
I therefore find that multiplicity of the religions is based in
the nature of religion.

That no man can perfectly possess all religion is easy to
see. Men are determined in one special way, religion is
endlessly determinable. But it must be equally evident
that religion is not dismembered and scattered in parts by
random among men, but that it must organize itself in ©
manifestations of varying degrees of resemblance. Recall |

THE RELIGIONS. 213

the several stages of religion to which I drew your attention.
I said that the religion of a person, to whom the world
reveals itself as a living whole, is not a mere continuation
of the view of the person who only sees the world in its
apparently hostile elements. By no amount of regarding
the Universe as chaotic and discrete can the higher view be
attained. These differences you may call kinds or degrees
of religion, but in either case you will have to admit that,
as in every similar case, the forms in which an infinite force
divides itself is usually characteristic and different.

Wherefore, plurality of religions is another thing thau
plurality of the church. The essence of the church is
fellowship. Its limit, therefore, cannot be the uniformity of
religious persons. It is just difference that should be
brought into fellowship.’ You are manifestly right when you
believe that the church can never in actuality be completely
and uniformly one. The only reason, however, is that
every society existing in space and time is thereby limited
and losing in depth what it gains in breadth, falls to pieces.
But religion, exactly by its multiplicity, assumes the utmost
unity of the church. This multiplicity is necessary for the
complete manifestation of religion. It must seek for a
definite character, not only in the individual but also in the
society. Did the society not contain a principle to indi-
vidualize itself, it could have no existence. Hence we
must assume and we must search for an endless mass of
distinct forms. Each separate religion claims to be such a
distinct form revealing religion, and we must see whether
it is agreeable to this principle. We must make clear to
ourselves wherein it is peculiar. Though the difference be
hidden under strange disguises, though it be distorted, not
only by the unavoidable influence of the transitory to which
the enduring has condescended, but also by the unholy
hand of sacrilegious men, we must find it.

To be satisfied with a mere general idea of religion would
not be worthy of you. Would you then understand it as

214 FIFTH SPEECH.

it really exists and‘ displays itself, would you comprehend
it as an endlessly progressive work of the Spirit that
reveals Himself in all human history, you must abandon
the vain and foolish wish that there should only be one
religion ; you must lay aside all repugnance to its multi-
plicity ; as candidly as possible you must approach every-
thing that has ever, in the changing shapes of humanity,
been developed in its advancing career, from the ever
fruitful bosom of the spiritual life.

The different existing manifestations of religion you call
positive religions. Under this name they have long been
the object of a quite pre-eminent hate. Despite of your re-
pugnance to religion generally, you have always borne more
easily with what for distinction is called natural religion,
You have almost spoken of it with esteem.

I do not hesitate to say at once that from the heart I en-
tirely deny this superiority. For all who have religion at
all and profess to love it, it would be the vilest inconse-
quence to admit it. They would thereby fall into the
openest self-contradiction, For my own part, if I only
succeeded in recommending to you this natural religion,
I would consider that I had lost my pains.

For you, indeed, to whom religion generally is offensive,
I have always considered this preference natural. The so-
called natural religion is usually so much refined away, and
has such metaphysical and moral graces, that little of the
peculiar character of religion appears. It understands so
well to live in reserve, to restrain and to accommodate
itself that it can be put up with anywhere. Every positive
religion, on the contrary, has certain strong traits and a
very marked physiognomy, so that its every movement,
even to the careless glance, proclaims what it really is.

If this is the true ground of your dislike, you must now
rid yourself of it. If you have now, as I hope, a better
estimate of religion, it should be no longer necessary for
me to contend against it. Ifyou see that a peculiar and

THE RELIGIONS. 215

noble capacity of man underlies religion, a capacity which,
of course, must be educated, it cannot be offensive to you
to regard it in the most definite forms in which it has yet
appeared. Rather you must the more willingly grant a
form your attention the more there is developed in it
the characteristic and distinctive elements of religion.

But. you may not admit this argument. You may
transfer all the reproaches you have formerly been accus-
tomed to bestow on religion in general to the single
religions. You may maintain that there are always, just in
this element that you call positive, the occasion and the
justification of those reproaches, and that in consequence
the positive religions cannot be as I have sought to repre-
sent, the natural manifestations of the true religion. You
would show me how, without exception, they are full of
what, according to my own statement, is not religion. Con-
sequently, must not a principle of corruption lie deep in their
constitution ? You will remind me that each one proclaims
that it alone is true, and that what is peculiar to it is absolutely
the highest.. Are they not distinguished from one another
by elements they should as much as possible eliminate?
In disproving and contending, be it with art and under-
standing, or with weapons stranger and more unworthy, do
they not show themselves quite contrary to the nature of
true religion? You would add that, exactly in proportion
as you esteem religion and acknowledge its importance,
you must take a lively interest in seeing that it everywhere
enjoys the greatest freedom to cultivate itself on all sides.
You must, therefore, hate keenly those definite religious
forms, that hold all their adherents to the same type and
the same word, withdraw the freedom to follow their own
nature and compress them in unnatural limits. In contrast,
you would praise mightily the superiority in all these
points of the natural to the positive religions.

Once more I say, I do not deny that misunderstandings
and perversions exist in all religions, and I raise no objec-

—

216 FIFTH SPEECH.

tions to the dislike with which they inspire you. Nay, I
acknowledge there is in them all this much bewailed de-
generation, this divergence into alien territory. The
diviner religion itself is, the less would I embellish its cor-
yuptions, or admiringly cherish its excrescences. But forget
for once this one-sided view and follow me to another.
Consider how much of this corruption is due to those who
have dragged forth religion from the depths of the heart
into the civil world. Acknowledge that much of it is un-
avoidable as soon as the Infinite, by descending into the
sphere of time and submitting to the general influence of
finite things, takes to itself a narrow shell. And however
deep-rooted this corruption may be, and however much the
religions may have suffered thereby, consider this also: if
the proper religious view of all things is to seek even in
things apparently common and base every trace of the
divine, the true and the eternal, and to reverence even the
faintest, you cannot omit what has the justest claims to be
judged religiously.

And you would find more than remote traces of the Deity.
I invite you to study every faith professed by man, every
religion that has a name and a character. Though it may
long ago have degenerated into a long series of empty
customs, into a system of abstract ideas and theories, will
you not, when you examine the original elements at the
source, find that this dead dross was once the molten out-
pourings of the inner fire? Is there not in all religions
more or less of the true nature of religion, as I have pre-
sented it to you? Must not, therefore, each religion be
one of the special forms which mankind, in some region
of the earth and at some stage of development, has to
accept ?

I must take care not to attempt anything systematic or
complete, for that would be the study of a life, and not the
business of a discourse. Yet you must not be allowed to
wander at hazard in this endless chaos. That you may not

THE RELIGIONS. 217

be misled by the false ideas that prevail; that you may
estimate by a right standard the true content and essence
of any religion; that you may have some definite and sure
procedure for separating the inner from the outer, the
native from the borrowed and extraneous, and the sacred
from the profane, forget the characteristic attributes of
single religions and seek, from the centre outwards, a
general view of how the essence of a positive religion is to
be comprehended and determined.

You will then find that the positive religions are just
the definite forms in which religion must exhibit itself—
a thing to which your so-called natural religions have no
claim. They are only a vague, sorry, poor thought that
corresponds to no reality, and you will find that in the
positive religions alone a true individual cultivation of the
“religious capacity is possible. Nor do they, by their nature,
injure the freedom of their adherents.

Why have I assumed that religion can only be given
fully in a great multitude of forms of the utmost definite-
ness? Only on grounds that naturally follow from what
has been said of the nature of religion. The whole of
religion is nothing but the sum of all relations of man to
God, apprehended in all the possible ways in which any
man can be immediately conscious in his life. In this sense
there is but one religion, for it would be but a poverty-
stricken and halting life, if all these relations did not exist
wherever religion ought to be. Yet all men will not by
any means apprehend them in the same way, but quite
differently. Now this difference alone is felt and alone
can be exhibited while the reduction of all differences is
only thought.

You are wrong, therefore, with your universal religion
that is natural to all, for no one will have his own true and
right religion, if itis the same for all. As long as we
occupy a place there must be in these relations of man to
the whole a nearer and a farther, which will necessarily

218 :. FIFTH SPEECH.

determine each feeling differently in each life. Again, as
long as we are individuals, every man has greater recep-
tiveness for some religious experiences and feelings than
for others. In this way everything is different. Mani-
festly then, no single relation can accord to every feeling
its due. It requires the sum of them. Hence, the whole
of religion can be present only, when all those different views
of every relation are actually given. This is not possible,
except in an endless number of different forms. They must
be determined adequately by a different principle of re-
ference to the others, and in each the same religious element
must be characteristically modified. In short, they must
be true individuals.

What determines and distinguishes these individuals, and
what, on the other hand, is common to all their component
parts, holds them together, and is their principle of adhesion,
whereby any given detail is to be adjudged to its own type
of religion, are implied in what has been already said. But
this view can only be verified by the existing historical
religions, and of them it is maintained that all this is
different, and that such is not their relation to one another.
This we must now examine.

First, a definite quantity of religious matter is not neces-
sarily, in the same degree, a definite form of religion.

This is an entire misunderstanding of the nature of the
different religions. Even among their adherents it is
general, and causes manifold opposite and false judgments.
They suppose that because so many men acknowledge the
same religion, they must have the same body of religious
views and feelings. Their fellow-believers must have the
same opinions and the same faith as they have, and this
common possession must be the essence of their religion.
The peculiarly characteristic and individual element in a
religion is not easy to find with certainty from instances,
but, however general the idea may be, if you believe that
it consists in including a definite sum of religious intuitions

THE RELIGIONS. 219

and feelings, and that as a consequence the positive religions
are prejudicial to the freedom of the individual in the de-
velopment of his own religion, you are in error. Single
perceptions and feelings are, as you know, the elements of
religion, and it can never lead to the character of any one
religion to regard them as a mere heap, tossed together
without regard to number, kind or purpose.

If now, as I have sought to show, religion needs to be
of many types because, of every relation different views
are possible, according as it stands related to the rest, how
would we be helped by such a compendium of some of them
that could define none? If the positive religions were only
distinguished by what they exclude, they could certainly
~ not be the individual manifestations we seek. That this is
not their character, however, appears from the impossibility
of arriving from this point of view at a distinct idea of
them,

As they continue to exist apart, such an idea must be
possible, for only what commingles in fact is inseparable in
idea. It is evident that the different religious perceptions
and feelings are not, in a determinate way, awakened by
one another or interdependent. Now, as each exists for
itself, each can lead, by the most various combinations, to
every other. Hence, different religions could not continue
long beside one another, if they were not otherwise dis-
tinguished. Very soon each would supplement itself into
uniformity with all others.

Even in the religion of any one man, as it is fashioned
in the course of life, nothing is more accidental than the
quantity of religious matter that may arrive at conscious-
ness. Some views may set and others may rise and come to
clearness, and his religion in this respect is ever in flux.
Much less can the boundary, which in the individual is so
changeable, be permanent and essential in the religion of
several associated individuals. In the highest degree it
must be an unusual and accidental occurrence that, even

220 FIFTH SPEECH.

for a little time, several men remain in the same circle of
perceptions and advance along the same path of feeling.’
Hence, among those who determine their religion in this
way, there is a standing quarrel about essentials and non-
essentials. They do not know what is to be laid down as.
characteristic and necessary, and what to separate as free
and accidental; they do not find the point from which the
whole can be surveyed; they do not understand the
religion in which they live and for which they presume to
fight; and they contribute to its degeneration, for, while
they are influenced by the whole, they consciously grasp
only the detail. Fortunately the instinct they do not
understand, guides them better than their understandings,
and nature sustains what their false reflections and the
doing and striving that flow from them would destroy. _
7 If the character of any special religion is found in a defi-
nite quantity of perceptions and feelings, some subjective
and objective connection, binding exactly these elements
together and excluding all others, must be assumed. This
false notion agrees well enough with the way of comparing
religious conceptions that is common but is not agreeable
to the spirit of religion. A whole of this type would not
be what we seek to give religion in its whole compass a de-
terminate shape. It would not be a whole, but an arbitrary
section of the whole ; it would not be a religion, it would
be a sect. Except by taking the religious experiences of
one single person, and necessarily of only one short period
of his life, as the norm for a society, it could hardly arise.
But the forms which history has produced and which are
now actually existing are not wholes of this sort. All sec-
tarianism, be it speculative, for bringing single intuitions
into a philosophical coherence, or ascetic, for reaching a
system and determinate series of feelings, labours for the
utmost uniformity among all who would share the same
fragment of religion. Those who are infected with this
mania certainly do not lack activity, and if they have never

THE RELIGIONS. 221

succeeded in reducing any one positive religion to a sect,’
you will have to acknowledge that the positive religions
must be formed on another principle and must have another
character.

You will see this even more clearly by thinking of the
times that gave them birth. You will recall how every
positive religion, in its growth and bloom, when its peculiar
vigour was most youthful, fresh and evident, did not con-
centrate and exclude, but expanded and pushed fresh shoots
and acquired more religious matter to be wrought up in
_ accordance with its own peculiar nature.

Therefore religions are not fashioned on this false prin-
ciple. It is not one with their nature, it is a corruption
that has crept in from the outside, as hostile to them as to
the spirit of religion generally. Their relation to it which
is a standing warfare, is another proof that they actually
are constituted as individual manifestations of religion
should be.

Just as little could the general differences of religion
suffice to produce a thoroughly definite individual form.
The three ways of being conscious of existence and of its
totality, as chaos, system and elemental diversity, so often
mentioned, are very far from being so many single and
distinct religions. Divide an idea to infinity if you will,
you cannot thereby reach an individual. You only get less
general ideas which may, as genus and species, embrace a
mass of very different individuals. To find the character
of individual beings, there must be more than the idea
and its attributes. But those three differences in religion
are only the usual division according to the current scheme
of unity,’ diversity and totality. They are types of religion
but not religious individualities, and the need to seek for
this individuality is by no means satisfied by the existence
of religion in this threefold way. It is clear as day that
there are many distinct manifestations of religion belonging
to each type. | :

222 . FIFTH SPEECH.

Just as little are the personal and the opposing panthe-
istic modes of conception two such individual forms.“ They
go through all three types of religion and, for that reason
alone, cannot be individualities. They are simply another

principle of division. Only recently we agreed that this.

antithesis rests simply on a way of regarding the religious
feeling, and of ascribing to its phenomena a common object.
Hence the fact that any particular religion inclines more
to one: form of representation and expression than to the
other, no more determines its individuality than it would
its worth and the stage of its development. The individual
elements of religion are as indefinite, and none of the various
ways of regarding them are realized, because either the one
or the other thought accompanies them. This may be seen
in all purely deistic manifestations of religion, Though
they desire to be considered quite definite, you will find
everywhere that all religious feelings, and especially what
is most dwelt on—all views of the movements of humanity
in the individual, of the highest unity of mankind, of every-
thing in the mutual relations of men that lies beyond each
man’s good pleasure, are utterly indefinite and ambiguous.
The personal and the- pantheistic conceptions, .therefore,
are only very general forms that may be further determined
and individualized in various ways.

Perhaps you may seek this further determination. by
uniting the two modes of conception with the three modes
of intuition. You would reach narrower sub-divisions, but
not a thoroughly definite and individual whole. Neither
naturalism —meaning perception of the world limited to
elemental diversity, without the conception of a personal
consciousness and will in the various elements—nor pan-
theism, nor polytheism, nor deism are single and definite
religions, such as we seek. They are simply types within
which there have been, and there will still be, very many
genuine individualities developed.°

Let me say then at once, that the only remaining way

Os ee, ee ee ey a Zu u aot Zu un u

THE RELIGIONS. 223

for a truly individual religion to arise is to select some one
of the great’relations of mankind in the world to the Highest
Being, and, in a definite way, make it the centre and refer
to it all the others. In respect of the idea of religion, this
may appear a merely arbitrary proceeding, but, in respect
of the peculiarity of the adherents, being the natural ex-
pression of their character, it is the purest necessity.
Hereby a distinctive spirit and a common character enter
the whole at the same time, and the ambiguous and vague
reach firm ground. By every formation of this kind one
of the endless number of different views and different
arrangements of the single elements, which are all possible
and all require to be exhibited, is fully realized. Single
elements are all seen on the one side that is turned towards
this central point, which makes all the feelings have a com-
mon tone and a livelier closer interaction.

The whole of religion can only be actually given in the
sum of all the forms possible in this sense. It can, there-
fore, be exhibted only in an endless series of shapes that are
gradually developed in different points of time and space,
and nothing adds to its complete manifestation that is not
found in one of those forms. Where religion is so moulded
that everything is seen and felt in connection with one{
relation to the Deity that mediates it or embraces it, it
matters not in what place or in what man it is formed or
what relation is selected, it is a strictly positive religion.
In respect of the sum of the religious elements—to use a
word that should again be brought to honour—it is a heresy,’
for from many equals one is chosen to be head of the rest.
In respect, however, of the fellowship of all participants and
their relation to the founder of their religion who first
raised this central point to clear consciousness, it is a school
and a discipleship.

But if, as is to be hoped, we are agreed that religion
can only be exhibited in and by such definite forms, only
those who with their own religion pitch their camp in some

224 p FIFTH SPEECH.

such positive form, have any fixed abode, and, if I might so
say, any well-earned right of citizenship in the religious
world. They alone can boast of contributing to the ex-
istence and the progress of the whole, and they alone are
in the full sense religious persons, on one side belonging
by community of type to a kindred, on the other being
distinguished by persistent and definite traits from everyone
else.

But many perhaps who take an interest in the affairs of
religion may ask with consternation, or some evil-disposed
person may ask with guile, whether every pious person must
connect himself with one of the existing forms of religion.
Provisionally, I would say, byno means. It is only necessary
that his religion be developed in himself characteristically
and definitely. That it should resemble any great, largely
accepted, existing form is not equally necessary. I would
remind him that I have never spoken of two or three definite
forms, and said that they are to be the only ones. Rather,
they may evermore develope in countless numbers from all
points. Whosoever does not find himself at home in an
existing religion, I might almost say whosoever is not in a
position to make it if he had not found it,* must belong to
none but should be held bound to produce a new one for
himself, Is he alone in it and without disciples, it does not
matter. Everywhere there are germs that cannot arrive at
any more extended existence, and the religion of one person
may have a definite form and organization, and be quite as
genuinely a positive religion as if he had founded the
greatest school.

In my opinion, then, you will see that the existing forms
should not in themselves hinder any man from developing
a religion suitable to his own nature and his own religious
sense. The question of abiding in one of them or of con-
structing a religion of one’s own, depends entirely on what
relation developes in a man as fundamental feeling and
middle-point of all religions.

THE RELIGIONS. 225

This is my provisional answer, but if he will hear more
I would add that, except by misunderstanding, it would be
very difficult to find oneself in such a position. A new re-
velation is never trivial,and merely personal, but always rests
on something great and common. Hence adherents and
fellow-believers have never failed the man really called to
institute a new religion. Most men, following their nature,
will belong to an existing form, and there will be only few
whom none suffices.

Yet—and this is my chief point—the authority being
the same for all, the many are no less free than the few,
and do no less fashion something of their own. If
we follow any man’s religious history, we find first dim —
presentiments which never quite stir the depths of the heart,
and, being unrecognized, again disappear. Around every
man, especially in earlier days, they doubtless hover. Some
hint may awaken them, and they may again vanish without
reaching any definite form and betraying aught characteristic.
Afterwards it first comes to pass that the sense for the
Universe rises once for all into clear consciousness. One
man discovers it in one relation, another in another. Here-
after all things are referred to this relation, and so group
themselves around it. Such a moment, therefore, in the
strictest sense, determines every man’s religion. Now I
hope you will not consider a man’s religion less charac-
teristic, less his own, because it lies in a region where
already several are collected. In this similarity you are
not to find a mechanical influence of custom or birth, but,
as you do in other cases, you are to recognize a common
determination by higher causes. This agreement is a
guarantee of naturalness and truth, and cannot, whether
one is first or last, be hurtful to individuality. Though
thousands before him and after him referred their religious
life to one relation, would it, therefore, be the same in all ?

Remember that every definite form of religion is
exhaustless for any one man. In its own way it should

Q

226 FIFTH SPEECH.

embrace the whole, a thing too great for any man. And
not only so, but in itself there exist endless varieties of
cultivation which are, as it were, subordinate types of
religion. Is there not here work and scope enough for all ?
I, at least, am not aware that any religion had succeeded
in so taking possession of its territory, and had so determined
and exhibited everything therein, according to its own
spirit, that, in any one professor of distinguished gifts and
individuality of mind, nothing is wanting to perfection.
Only to few of our historical religion has it been granted,
even in the time of their freedom and higher life, to develope
rightly and perfectly the neighbourhood of the middle-point,
and, in even a few forms, to give individual impress to the
common character. The harvest is great but the labourers
are few. An infinite field is opened in each of those
religions, wherein thousands may scatter themselves.
Uncultivated regions enough present themselves to every
one who is capable of making and producing something of
his own.’ |

The charge that everyone who allows himself to be
embraced in a positive religion, can only be an imitator of
those who have given it currency and cannot develope
himself individually, is baseless. This judgment no more
applies here, than it would to the state or to society.
It seems to us morbid or quixotic for any one to maintain
that he has no room in any existing institution, and that
he must exclude himself from society. We are convinced
that every healthy person will, in common with many, have
a great national character. Just because he is rooted in it
and influenced by it, he can develope his individuality with
the greatest precision and beauty. Similarly, in religion
only morbid aberration so cuts off a man from a life in
fellowship with those among whom nature has placed him,
that he belongs to no great whole. Somewhere, on a great
scale, everyone will find exhibited or will himself exhibit
what for him is the middle-point of religion. To every such

THE RELIGIONS. 227

common sphere we ascribe a boundless activity that goes
into detail, in virtue of which all individual characteristics
issue from its bosom. Thus understood, the church is with
right called the common mother of us all.

“To take the nearest example, think of Christianity as a
definite individual form of the highest order. First there is
in our time the well known outward division, so definite and
pronounced. Under each section there is then a mass of
different views and schools. Each exhibits a characteristic
development, and has a founder and adherents, yet the last
and most personal development of religiousness remains for
each individual, and so much is it one with his nature that
no one can fully acquire it but himself. And the more a
man, by his whole nature, has a claim to belong to you, ye
cultured, the more religion must reach this stage in him, for
his higher feeling, gradually developing and uniting with
other educated capacities, must be a characteristic product.

Or if, after unknown conception and rapid birth-pangs of
the spirit, the higher feelings develope, to all appearance
suddenly, is not then a characteristic personality born with
the religious life? There is a definite connection with a past,
a present and a future. The whole subsequent religious
_ life is linked in this way to that moment and that state in

which this feeling surprised the soul. It thus maintains its
connection with the earlier, poorer life, and has a natural
uniform development. Nay more, in this initial consciousness
there must already be a distinctive character. Only inashape
and only under circumstances thoroughly definite, could it
so suddenly enter a life already developed. This distinctive
character, then, every subsequent moment displays and is
thus the purest expression of the whole nature. ‘The living
spirit of the earth, rending itself from itself as it were, links
himself as a finite thing to one definite moment in the series
of organic evolutions and a new man arises, a peculiar
nature. His separate existence is independent of the mass
and objective quality either of his circumstances or his

Q 2

228 FIFTH SPEECH.

actions. It consists in the peculiar unity of the abiding ©
consciousness that is linked to that first moment, and in the
peculiar relation to it which every later moment preserves.
Wherefore, in that moment in which in any man a definite
consciousness of his relation to the highest Being has, as it
were, original birth, an individual religious life originates.
It is individual, not by an irreversible limitation to a
particular number and selection of feelings and intuitions,
not by the quality of the religious matter. This matter all
who have the spiritual birth at the same time and in the
same religious surroundings have in common. But it is
individual by what he can have in common with no man, by
the abiding influence of the peculiar circumstances in which
his spirit was first greeted and embraced by the Universe,
and by the peculiar way in which he conducts his observa-
tion and reflection on the same. This character and tone
of the first childhood of his religion are borne by the whole
subsequent course of his views and feelings, and are never
lost, however far he may advance in fellowship with the
Eternal Fountainhead.
zg very intelligent finite being announces its spiritual
nature and individuality by taking you back to what I may
call a previous marriage in him of the Infinite with the finite,
and your imagination refuses to explain it from any single
prior factor, whether caprice or nature. In the same way
you must regard as an individual everyone who can point
to the birthday of his spiritual life and relate a wondrous
tale of the rise of his religion as an immediate operation of
the Deity, an influence of His spirit. He must be charac-
teristic and special, for such an event does not happen to
produce in the kingdom of religion vain repetition.” Every-
thing that originates organically and is self-contained can
only be explained from itself. If its origin and individuality
are not regarded as mutually explanatory and identical, it
can never be quite understood. Thus you can only under-
stand the religious person in so far as you know how to

THE RELIGIONS. 229

discover the whole in the notable moment that began his
higher life, or from the developed manifestation can trace
back this uniform character to the first, dimmest times of
life.

All this being well considered, it will not be possible for
you, I believe, to be in earnest with this complaint against
the positive religions. If you still persist in it, it can only
be from prejudice, for you are far too careless about the
matter to be justified by your own observation. You have
never felt the call to attach yourselves to the few religious
men you might be able to discover. Though they are ever
attractive and worthy enough of love, you have never tried
by the microscope of friendship, or even of closer sympathy,
to examine more accurately how they are organized both by
and for the Universe.

_ For myself I have diligently considered them, I have
sought out as patiently and studied them with the same
reverent care that you devote to the curiosities of nature,
and it has often occurred to me whether you would not be
led to religion simply by giving heed to the almighty way
in which the Deity builds up, from all that has otherwise
been developed in man, that part of the soul in which He
specially dwells, manifests His immediate operation, and
mirrors Himself, and thus makes His sanctuary quite
peculiar and distinct, and if you only noticed how He glori-
fies Himself in it by the exhaustless variety and opulence of
forms. I, at least, am ever anew astonished at the many
notable developments in a region so sparsely peopled as
religion. Menare distinguished by all degrees of receptivity
for the charm of the same object and by the greatest differ-
ence of effect, by the variety of tone produced by the prepon-
derance of one or other type of feeling, by all sorts of idiosyn-
crasies of sensitiveness and peculiarity of temperament,
and the religious view of things nevertheless is perpetually
prominent. Again I see how the religious character of a man
is often something quite peculiar in him, strongly marked

230 FIFTH SPEECH.

off to the common eye from everything else shown in his
other endowments. The most quiet and sober mind may be
capable of the strongest, most passionate emotions ; a sense
most dull to common and earthly things feels deeply even
to sadness, and sees clearly even to rapture and prophecy ;
a heart most timid in all worldly matters testifies even by
martyrdom to the world and to theage. And how wonder-
fully is this religious character itself fashioned and composed.
Culture and crudeness, capacity and limitation, tenderness
and hardness are in each, in a peculiar way, mixed and inter-
woven.

Where have I seen all this? In the peculiar sphere of
religion, in its individual forms, in the positive religions
which you decry as utterly wanting in variety. I have seen
it among the heroes and martyrs of a definite faith in a way
for which the friends of natural religion are too cold, among
enthusiasts for living feeling, in a way they hold as too
dangerous, among the worshippers of some new sprung
light and individual revelation. There I will show you them,
there at all times and among all peoples. Nowhere else are
they to be met. No man as a mere single being can come
to actual existence. By the very fact of existence he is set
in a world, in a definite order of things, and becomes an object
among other objects, and a religious man, by attaining his
individual life, enters by this very fact into a common life,
which is to say into some definite form of religion. The two
things are simply one and the same divine act, and cannot
be separated. If the original capacity of a man is too weak
to reach this highest stage of consciousness, by fashioning
itself in a definite way, the stimulus must also be too weak
to initiate the process of a characteristic and robust religious
life. |

And now I have rendered you my account. Itisfor you
now to tell me how, in respect of development and indi-
viduality, it stands with your boasted natural religions.
Show me among its professors an equally great variety of

THE RELIGIONS. 231

strongly marked characters. For myself I must confess
that I have never found among them anything of the sort.
Your boast of the freedom that this kind of religion gives
its adherents to develope themselves religiously according
to their own sense, seems merely of freedom to remain un-
developed, freedom neither to be, nor to see, nor to feel
anything at all that is definite. Religion plays in their
mind far too wretched a role. It is as if religion had no
pulse, no vasculary system, no circulation, and so had no
heat, no assimilative power. It has no character of its
own, no peculiar presentation. Everywhere it shows itself
dependent upon the cast of a man’s morals and sensibility.
In union with them, or rather meekly following them, it
moves idly and sparingly, and is only perceptible when it is
patiently, and, as it were by drops, separated from them.

Many estimable and strong religious characters, indeed, I
have met, whom the adherents of the positive religions,
not without wondering at the phenomenon, regard as ad-
herents of natural religion. But on closer view they
recognized them as their confréres. Such persons have
always swerved somewhat from the original purity of the
religion of reason, and have accepted something arbitrary,
as it is called, something positive.

But why do those who respect natural religion at once
distrust everyone who introduces any characteristic feature
into his religion? They also would have uniformity,
though at the opposite extreme from sectarianism, the
uniformity of indefiniteness. So little is any special per-
sonal cultivation through the positive religions to be thought
of, that its most genuine adherents do not even wish the
religion of man to have any history of its own at all or to
commence with any notable event. Too much there has
been already for their taste, moderation being for them
the chief matter in religion, and all who can boast of
religious emotions issuing suddenly from the depths of
the heart, come at once into the evil repute of being in-

232 FIFTH SPEECH.

fected by baleful enthusiasm. By little and little men are
to become religious, just as they become wise and prudent
and everything else they should be. All must come to
them by instruction and education. There must be
nothing that could be regarded as supernatural or even as.
singular.

I would not say that in making instruction and education
everything, natural religion has pre-eminently fallen into
the evil of being mixed with metaphysics and morals, nay,
of being changed into them: but this at least is clear, that
its adherents have not started from any living self-contem-
plation and allowing nothing to mark their cast of thought,
whereby in any characteristic way men might be affected,
they have no sure middle-point. ‘The belief in a personal
God, more or less anthropomorphic, and in a personal im-
mortality, more or less dematerialized and sublimated—the
two dogmas to which they reduce everything—depends, as
they know themselves, on no special way of viewing or
comprehending. Hence, any one who joins them is not
asked how he came to his faith, but how he can demonstrate
it. Thus they assume that he must have reached every-
thing by demonstration. Any other and more definite
middle-point you would have difficulty in indicating. The
little that their meagre and attenuated religion does con-
tain is of great ambiguity. They have a providence in
general, a righteousness in general, a divine education in
general. Now it is in this perspective and fore-shortening,
now in that, so that the value of everything is perpetually
changing. Orif there is any common reference to one
point, it is to something alien to religion, such as how to
remove obstacles from morality, or sustain the desire for
happiness, or something else about which, in ordering the
elements of their religion, truly religious men have never
asked. Their scanty religious possessions are thereby still
more scattered and dispersed.

y This natural religion, then, does not unite its religious

. THE RELIGIONS. 233

elements by one definite view and is no definite religious
form, no proper individual representation of religion.
Those who profess it have in its territory no definite
dwelling, but are strangers whose home, if indeed they
have any, must be elsewhere. They remind one of the
thin and dispersed mass said to float between the worlds,
which is here attracted by one and there by another, but
not enough by any to be swept into its rotation. Why it
exists the gods may know. It must be to show that the
indefinite also can have a certain existence. Yet it is
properly only a waiting for existence, to which they can
only attain by the power of some force stronger and of a
different kind from any they have been subjected to here-
tofore. More I cannot ascribe to them than the dim pre-
sentiments that precede that living consciousness in which
religious life comes to visibility for man. There are certain
dim impulses and conceptions that have no coherence with
a man’s individuality and only, as it were, fill up the vacant
spaces. They originate only in the collective life, and are
uniformly the same in all. The religion of men of this
kind is thus the inarticulate echo of the piety around
them.

At the highest it is natural religion in the sense in
which men used to speak of natural philosophy and natural
poetry. The name was applied to such productions as
lacked originality, and which, without being clumsy, con-
scious imitations, were but crude utterances of superficial
endowments. The epithet was meant to distinguish them
from the works of living, plastic science and art.

The better part found only in the productions of the
religious societies, they do not wait for with longing, they
do not esteem it more highly because they cannot reach it,
but they oppose it with all their might. The essence of
natural religion consists almost entirely in denying every-
thing positive and characteristic in religion and in violent
polemics. It is the worthy product of an age, the hobby of

234 FIFTH SPEECH.

which was that wretched generality and vain soberness
which in everything was most hostile to true culture. Two
things are hated supremely, a commencement in anything
extraordinary and incomprehensible, and subsequently any
suggestion of a school. This same corruption you will find ©
in all arts and sciences. Into religion also it has forced
its way, and its product is this empty formless thing. Men
would be self-produced and self-taught in religion, and they
are rude and uncultured, as is common with such persons.
For characteristic production they have neither power nor
will. Every definite religion they resist because it is a
school, and if they should light on anything whereby a
religion of their own might be fashioned, they would be as
violent against it, seeing that from it also a school might
arise. }

Hence their resistance to the positive and arbitrary is
resistance to the definite and real. If a definite religion
may not begin with an original fact, it cannot begin at all.
There must be a common ground for selecting some one
religious element and placing it at the centre, and this
ground can only be a fact. And if a religion is not to be
definite it is not a religion at all, for religion is not a name
to be applied to loose, unconnected impulses. Recall what
the poet says of a state of souls before birth. Suppose
someone were to object to come into the world because he
would not be this man or that, but a man in general! The
polemic of natural religion against the positive is this
polemic against life and it is the permanent state of its
adherents.

Go back then, if you are in earnest about beholding
religion in its definiteness, from this enlightened natural
religion to those despised positive religions. There every-
thing appears active, strong and secure, every single
intuition has its definite content and its own relation to the
rest, and every feeling has its proper sphere and its peculiar
reference. You find somewhere every modification of

THE RELIGIONS. 235

religiousness and every mental state in which religion can
place men, with each of its effects somewhere complete.
Common institutions and single utterances alike testify that
religion is valued almost to forgetfulness of all else. The
holy zeal with which it is contemplated, communicated and
enjoyed, and the .child-like longing with which new reve-
lations of heavenly power are expected," guarantee that no
element visible from this standpoint shall be overlooked,
and that nothing has disappeared without leaving a monu-
ment. Consider the variety of forms in which every single
kind of fellowship with the Universe has already appeared.
Do not be scared either by mysterious darkness or by
wonderful dazzling grotesque traits. Do not admit the
delusion that it may all be imagination and romance. Dig
ever deeper where your magic rod has once pointed, and
without fail you will bring forth the heavenly stream to the
light of day.

But regard also the human which is to receive the
divine. Do not forget that religion bears traces of the
culture of every age and of the history of every race of men.
Often it must go about in the form of a servant, displaying
in its surroundings and in its adorning the poverty of its
home and its disciples. You must not overlook how it has
often been stunted in its growth from want of room to
exercise its powers, and how from childhood it has pined
miserably from bad treatment and ill-chosen nourishment.

And if you would comprehend the whole, do not abide by
the various forms of religion that for centuries have shone
and have dominated great peoples, and have been glorified
in many ways by poets and sages. Recollect that what is
historically and religiously most noteworthy is often dis-
tributed among but few, and remains hidden to the common
eye.”

But when, in this way, you have wholly and completely
within your vision the right object, it will ever remain a diffi-
cult business to discover the spirit of the religions and from

236 FIFTH SPEECH:

it to interpret them. Once more I warn you not to try to
deduce it as an abstraction from the elements common to
all the adherents. You will wander into a thousand vain
researches, and come in the end not to the spirit of the reli-
gion but to a definite quantity of matter. You will remem-
ber that no religion has quite reached actuality, and that
you cannot know it until, far removed from seeking it in
a narrow space, you are able to complete and define it in
the way it would develope if its scope had been large enough.
And as this applies to every positive religion, it applies to
every period of it and to every subordinate form of it. You
cannot enough impress it upon yourselves that it all resolves
itself into finding the fundamental relation. Without that,
knowledge of details is unavailing, and you have not found
it till all details are fast bound in one.

Even with this principle of research as a touchstone, you
will be exposed to a thousand errors, for much will meet
you to withdraw your eyes from the true path. Above all,
I beseech you, never forget the difference between the
essence of a religion, in so far as itis a definite form and
representation of religion in general and its unity as a
school.

Religious men are throughout historical. That is not
their smallest praise, but it is also the source of great mis-
understandings. The moment when they were first filled
with that consciousness which they have made the centre
of their religion is always sacred for them. Without refer-
ence to it, they never speak of what for them is character-
istic in religion and of the form to which in themselves it
has attained. You can easily imagine, then, how,much more
sacred still the moment must be in which this infinite
intuition was first of all set up in the world as the founda-
tion and centre of one peculiar religion. To it the whole
development of this religion in all generations and indi-
viduals is historically linked. Now this sum of the religion,
and the religious culture of a great body of mankind, is

THE RELIGIONS. 237

something infinitely greater than a man’s own religious
life, and the little mirror of this religion which he person-
ally exhibits. This fact then is glorified in all ways; every
ornament of religious art is heaped upon it. It is wor-
shipped as the greatest and most blessed miracle of the
Highest. Men never speak of their religion, nor ever exhibit
any of its elements except in connection with this fact.

As a consequence nothing is more natural than that this
fact should be confused with the fundamental intuition of
the religion. This has misled almost everyone and dis-
torted the view of almost all religions. Never forget that
the fundamental intuition of a religion must be some
intuition of the Infinite in the finite, some one universal
religious relation, found in every other religion that would
be complete, but in this one only placed in the centre.

I beg you also not to regard everything found in the
heroes of religion or in the sacred sources as religion. Do
not seek in everything the decisive spirit of that religion.
Nor do I exclude trifles merely, or things that on any
estimate are foreign to religion, but things often mistaken
forit. Recollect how undesignedly those sources were pre-
pared, so that it was impossible to provide for the ex-
clusion of everything not religion. And recall how the
authors lived in all sorts of circumstances in the world, and
could not say at every word they wrote, this does not
belong to the faith. When they speak worldly wisdom
and morality, or metaphysics and poetry, therefore, do not
at once conclude that it must be forced into religion, or
that in it the character of religion is to be sought. Morality,
at least, should be everywhere only one, and religion which
should not be anywhere one, cannot be distinguished by
the differences of morality, which are always something to
be got rid of."

Above all I beg you not to be misled by the two hostile
principles that everywhere, and almost from the earliest
times, have sought to distort and obscure the spirit of

238 FIFTH SPEECH.

religion. Some would circumscribe it to a single dogma,
and exclude everything not fashioned in agreement with it,
others, from hatred to polemics, or to make religion more
agreeable to the irreligious, or from misunderstanding and
ignorance of the matter, or from lack of religious sense, ©
decry everything characteristic as dead letter. Guard your-
selves from both. With rigid systematizers or shallow
indifferentists you will not find the spirit of a religion. It
is found only among those who live in it as their element,
and ever advance in it without cherishing the folly that
they embrace it all.

Whether with these precautions you will succeed in dis-
covering the spirit of the religions I do not know. I fear
religion is only comprehensible through itself, and that its
special architecture and characteristic difference will not
become clear till you yourselves belong to some one
religion.

How you may succeed in deciphering the rude and un-
developed religions of remote peoples, or in unravelling
the manifold, varied religious phenomena lying wrapped up
in the beautiful mythologies of Greece and Rome, I care
very little. May your gods guide you! But when you
approach the holiest in which the Universe in its highest
unity and comprehensiveness is to be perceived, when you
would contemplate the different forms of the highest stage
of religion which is not foreign or strange, but more or
less existent among ourselves, I cannot be indifferent
as to whether or not you find the right point of view.

Of one form only I should speak, for Judaism is long
since dead. ‘Those who yet wear its livery are only sitting
lamenting beside the imperishable mummy, bewailing its
departure and its sad legacy. Yet I could still wish to say
a word on this type of religion. My reason is not that
it was the forerunner of Christianity. I hate that kind of
historical reference. Each religion has in itself its own
eternal necessity, and its beginning is original, Bu the

THE RELIGIONS. 239

beautiful childlike character of Judaism charms me. This
is so entirely overlaid, and we have here such a notable
example of the corruption and utter extinction of religion
in a great body in which it formerly existed, that it will
well repay a few words. Remove everything political and
moral as well, so God will, whereby this phenomenon is
supposed to be characterized. Forget the experiment of
joining the state to religion, if I should not say to the
church ; forget that Judaism was, in a certain sense, an
‘ order founded on an ancient family history and sustained
by priests. Regard only its strictly religious elements, and
then say what is the human consciousness of man’s nositiony
in the Universe and his relation to the Eternal that every-
where shines through. Is it anything but a relation of
universal immediate retribution, of a peculiar reaction of
the Infinite against every finite thing that can be regarded
as proceeding from caprice? In this way everything is
regarded, growth and decay, fortuneand misfortune. Even
in the human soul freedom and caprice interchange with
immediate operation of the Deity. All other recognized
attributes of God express themselves in accordance with
this principle, and are always regarded in their bearing
upon it. The Deity is throughout represented as rewarding,
punishing, disciplining single things in single persons.
When the disciples asked Christ, “Who has sinned, this
man or his parents?” the religious spirit of Judaism ap-
peared in its most pronounced form, and his answer : “ Think
ye that these have sinned more than others?” was his
polemic against it.

The universal interweaving of parallelism, therefore, is
not an accident, nor the value set on dialogue. All history,
being an abiding interchange between this attraction and
this repulsion, is presented as a colloquy in word and deed
between God and man, and what unity there is, is only from
the uniformity of this dealing, and hence the sacredness of
the tradition in which the connection of this great dialogue

240 FIFTH SPEECH.

was contained, the impossibility of attaining religion, except
through initiation into this connection, and hence also,
in later times, the strife among the sects about the pos-
session of this intercourse.

Just because of this view, it came to pass that the gift
of prophecy was developed in Judaism as in no other re-
ligion. Even Christians are, in comparison, mere learners.
‘The whole idea of the religion is in the highest degree
childlike. It could only work on a narrow scene, without
complications, where the whole being simple, the natural
consequences of actions would not be disturbed or hindered.
The more the adherents of this religion advanced on the
scene of the world and had relations with other peoples,
the more difficult did the exhibition of this idea become.
Imagination had to anticipate the word which the Almighty
would speak, and, abolishing intervening time and space,
bring the second part of the same transaction immediately
before the eyes. That is the essence of prophecy, and the
effort after it was necessarily a prominent feature of
Judaism, so long as it was possible to hold fast the fun-
damental idea and original form of the Jewish religion.

The belief in the Messiah was its highest product, its
noblest fruit, but also its last effort. A new sovereign
must come to restore Zion, wherein the voice of the Lord
was dumb, to its original splendour. By the subjection of
the peoples to the old law, the simple course of patriarchal
times, broken by the unpeaceful association of peoples, the
opposition of their forces, and the difference of the'r
customs, should again become general. This faith has long
persisted, and, like a solitary fruit, after all life has vanished,
hangs and dries on the withered stem till the rudest season
of the year.

The limited point of view allowed this religion, as a
religion, but a short duration. It died, and as its sacred
books were closed, the intercourse of Jehovah with His
people was looked upon as ended. The political associa-

THE RELIGIONS. 24

tion linked with it dragged on still longer a feeble existence.
Till very much later its external part endured, and was
that unpleasant phenomenon, a mechanical motion from
which life and spirit have long vanished.

The original intuition of Christianity is more glorious,
more sublime, more worthy of adult humanity, penetrates
deeper into the spirit of systematic religion and extends
itself further over the whole Universe. It is just the
intuition of the Universal resistance of finite things to the
unity of the Whole, and of the way the Deity treats this
resistance. Christianity sees how He reconciles the
hostility to Himself, and sets bounds to the ever-increasing
alienation by scattering points here and there over the -
whole that are at once finite and infinite, human and
divine. Corruption and redemption, hostility and media-
tion, are the two indivisibly united, fundamental elements
of this type of feeling, and by them the whole form of
Christianity and the cast of all the religious matter con-
tained in it are determined. With ever-increasing speed
the spiritual world has departed from its perfection and
imperishable beauty. All evil, even this that the finite
must decay before it has completed the circuit of its
existence, is a consequence of the will, of the self-seeking
endeavour of the isolated nature that, everywhere rending
itself from its connection with the Whole, seeks to be
something by itself. Death itself has come on account of
sin. The spiritual world, going from bad to worse, is
incapable of any production in which the Divine Spirit
actually lives. The understanding being darkened has
swerved from the truth; the heart is corrupt and has no
praise before God; the image of the Infinite in every part
of finite nature has gone extinct.

In accordance with this state of the spiritual world, all
dealings of Divine Providence are calculated. They are
never directed to the immediate results for feeling; they
do not consider the happiness or suffering which they pro-

| R

242 FIFTH SPEECH.

duce; they are not even for hindering or forwarding
certain actions. They are simply calculated to check
corruption, in the great masses, to destroy, without mercy,
what can no more be restored, and with new powers to
give birth to new creations. Wherefore He does signs
and wonders that interrupt and shake the course of things,
and sends ambassadors, with more or less of divine spirit
indwelling, to pour out divine powers upon men.

And when man does seek through self-consciousness to
enter into fellowship with the unity of the Whole, the finite
resists him, and he seeks and does not find and loses what
he has found. He is defective, variable and attached to
details and non-essentials. He wills rather than gives heed,
and his aim vanishes from his eyes. In vain is every
revelation. Everything is swallowed up by the earthly
sense, everything is swept away by the innate irreligious
principle. The Deity finds ever new devices. By His
power alone, ever more glorious revelations issue from the
bosom of the old. He sets up ever more exalted mediators
between Himself and men. In every later ambassador the
Deity unites with humanity ever more closely, that men
may learn to know the Eternal Being. Yet the ancient
complaint that man cannot comprehend what is from the
Spirit of God is never taken away.

This is how Christianity most and best is conscious of
God, and of the divine order in religion and history. It
manipulates religion itself as matter for religion. It is
thus a higher power of religion, and this most distinguishes
its character and determines its whole form. Because it
presupposes a widely-extended godlessness it is through
and through polemical. It is polemical in its outward com-
munication, for, to make its deepest nature evident, every
corruption must be laid bare, be it in morals or in thinking.
Above all it must expose the hostility to the consciousness
of the Highest Being, which is the irreligious principle
itself. Relentlessly it unmasks every false morality, every

THE RELIGIONS. 243

bad religion, every unhappy union of both for mutual
covering of nakedness. Into the inmost secrets of the
corrupt heart it presses and illumines, with the sacred
torch of personal experience, every evil that creeps in dark-
ness. Almost its first work on appearing was to destroy
the last expectation of its pious contemporaries, saying it
was irreligious and godless to expect any other restoration
than restoration to purer faiths, to the higher view of
_ things and to eternal life in God. Boldly it led the heathen
beyond the separation they had made between the world
of the gods and the world of men. Not to live and move
and have the being in God is to be entirely ignorant of
Him. If this natural feeling, this inner consciousness is
lost amid a mass of sense impressions and desires, no
religion has yet entered the narrow sense. Everywhere,
then, its heralds tore open the whited sepulchres and
brought the dead bones to light. Had these first heroes of
Christianity been philosophers, they would have spoken as
strongly against the corruption of philosophy. ‘They never
failed to recognize the outlines of the divine image.
Behind all distortions and degradations they saw hidden
the heavenly germ of religion. But as Christians they
were chiefly concerned with the individual who was far
from God and needed a mediator.

Christianity, moreover, is as sharply and strongly po-
lemical within its own borders, and in the inmost fellow-
ship of the saints. Just because religion is nowhere so
fully idealized as in Christianity, through its original pos-
tulate, perpetual warfare against all that is actual in religion
is presented asa duty that can never be sufficiently fulfilled.
And just because the ungodly is everywhere operative,
because all actuality together appears unholy, an infinite
holiness is the aim of Christianity. Never content with its
attainments, it seeks, even in its purest productions, even
in its holiest feelings, traces of irreligion and of the ten-
dency of all finite things to turn away from the unity of the

R 2

244 FIFTH SPEECH.

Whole. In the tone of the highest inspiration an ancient
writer criticizes the religious state of the community ; in
simple openness the great apostles speak of themselves.
And this is how every man is to walk in the sacred circle.
He is not only to be an inspired man and a teacher, but in
humility he is to present himself also to the universal
testing. Nor shall anything be spared, not even what is
most loved and dear; nor shall anything be indolently put
aside, not even what is most generally acknowledged.

Though without it be praised as holy and be set up before
the world as the essence of religion, within it must be sub-
jected to a severe and repeated test. Thus impurities are
to be removed, and the splendour of the heavenly colours
to shine more clearly in every pious impulse of the spirit.

In nature you often see a compound mass, as soon as its
chemical powers have overcome outside resistance or reduced
it to equilibrium, take to fermenting, and eject one and
another element. So it is with Christianity, it turns at last
its polemical power against itself. Ever anxious, lest in its
struggle with external irreligion it has admitted something
alien, or may yet have in itself some principle of corruption,
it does not avoid even the fiercest inward commotions to
eject the evil.

This is the history of Christianity that is rooted in its
very nature, “Iam not come to bring peace, but a sword,”
the Founder Himself said. His gentle soul could not pos-
sibly have meant that He was come to occasion those bloody
commotions, so utterly contrary to the spirit of religion, or
that wretched strife of words that deals with dead matter
which living religion does not admit. But what He did
foresee, and in foreseeing command, were those holy wars
that spring necessarily from the essence of His teaching, and
which, as bitterly as He describes, rend hearts asunder and
dissolve the most intimate relations of life.

But not only are the elements of Christianity themselves
subjected to this perpetual sifting; in their unbroken

THE RELIGIONS. 7 es

existence and life in the spirit there is an insatiable longing
for ever stricter purification, ever richer fulness. Irreligion
is thought to dominate every moment in which the religious
principle is not evident in the mind. Religion has no other
opposite than just the absence of religious purpose: every
interruption of religion is irreligion. If the mind is fora
moment without intuition and feeling of the Infinite, it at
once becomes conscious of hostility and remoteness. Chris-
tianity then demands as first and essential that piety be a
constant state. It scorns to be satisfied, even with the
strongest displays of it, as soon as it only rules certain por-
tions of the life. Piety should never rest, and there should
never be anything so absolutely opposed as to be incon-
sistent with it. From all finite things we should see the
Infinite. We should be in a position to associate religious
feelings and ‘views with all sentiments, however they may
have arisen, and with all actions, whatever be their object.
That is the true highest aim of mastery in Christianity.
How the fundamental view in Christianity, the view
to which all others are referred, determines the charac-
ter of its feelings is easy to discover. What do you call
that feeling of an unsatisfied longing which is directed
towards a great object, and which you are conscious is
infinite? What impresses you on finding the sacred and
the profane, the noble with the common and the mean
intimately united? And what is the mood that urges
you at times to assume the universality of this combination,
and to search for it everywhere? With Christians this
holy sadness is not occasional, but is the dominant tone of
all their religious feelings. That is the only name which
the language affords me. It accompanies every joy and
every pain, every love and every fear. Nay, in its pride
and in its humility it is the ground tone. If you can re-
construct the depths of a spirit from single features, undis-
-turbed by foreign elements that have come from who knows
where, you will find this feeling throughout dominant in the

246 FIFTH SPEECH.

Founder of Christianity. If a writer, who has left but a
few leaves in a simple speech is not too unimportant for
your attention, you will discover this tone in every word
remaining to us from his bosom friend.“ And if ever a
Christian has allowed you to listen in the sanctuary of his.
soul, you have certainly caught just the same tone.

Such is Christianity. Its distortions and manifold cor-
ruptions I will not spare, for the corruptibility of every holy
thing, as soon as it becomes human, is part of its funda-
mental view of the world. And I will not go farther into
the details of it. Its doings are before you, and I believe I
have given you the thread that, guiding you through all
anomalies, will make the closest scrutiny possible. From
first to last look only at the clearness, the variety, and the
richness with which that first idea has been developed.

When, in the mutilated delineations of His life I con-
template the sacred image of Him who has been the author
of the noblest that there has yet been in religion, it is not
the purity of His moral teaching, which but expressed what
all men who have come to consciousness of their spiritual
nature, have with Him in common, and which, neither from
its expression nor its beginning, can have greater value,
that I admire; and it is not the individuality of His cha-
racter, the close union of high power with touching gentle-
ness, for every noble, simple spirit must in a special situa-
tion display some traces of a great character. All those
things are merely human. But the truly divine element
is the glorious clearness to which the great idea He
came to exhibit attained in His soul. This idea was, that
all that is finite requires a higher mediation to be in
accord with the Deity, and that for man under the power of
the finite and particular, and too ready to imagine the
divine itself in this form, salvation is only to be found in

redemption. Vain folly it is to wish to remove the veil

that hides the rise of this idea in Him, for every begin-
ning in religion, as elsewhere, is mysterious. The prying

THE RELIGIONS. 247

sacrilege that has attempted it can only distort the divine.
He is supposed to have taken His departure from the
ancient idea of His people, and He only wished to utter its
abolition which, by declaring Himself to be the Person
they expected, He did most gloriously accomplish. Let us
consider the living sympathy for the spiritual world that
filled His soul, simply as we find it complete in Him.

If all finite things require the mediation of a higher
being, if it is not to be ever further removed from the
Eternal and be dispersed into the void and transitory, if its
union with the Whole is to be sustained and come to con-
sciousness, what mediates must not again require mediation,
and cannot be purely finite. It must belong to both sides,
participating in the Divine Essence in the same way and
in the same sense in which it participates in human nature.
But what did He see around Him that was not finite and in
need of mediation, and where was aught that could mediate
but Himself? ‘ No man knoweth the Father but the Son,
and He to whom the Son shall reveal Him.” This con-
sciousness of the singularity of His knowledge of God and
of His existence in God, of the original way in which this
knowledge was in Him, and of the power thereof to com-
municate itself and awake religion, was at once the con-
sciousness of His office as mediator and of His divinity.

I would not speak of Him as standing opposed to the
rude power of His foes without hope of longer life, for
that is unspeakably unimportant. But when, forsaken in
the thought of being silenced for ever, without seeing any
outward institution for fellowship among His own actually
set up, when in the face of the solemn splendour of the old
corrupt system that had so mightily-resisted Him, when
surrounded by all that could inspire awe and demand sub-
jection, by all that, from childhood, He had been taught to
honour, sustained by nothing but that feeling, He uttered
without delay that Yea, the greatest word mortal ever
spake, it was the most glorious apotheosis, and no divinity

248 FIFTH SPEECH.

can be more certain than that which He Himself thus
_ proclaimed,”

With this faith in Himself, who can wonder at His
assurance that He was not only a mediator for many, but
would leave behind a great school that would derive their
religion from His? So certain was He that before it yet
existed He appointed symbols for it. This He did in the
conviction that they would suffice to bring the band of His
disciples to a secure existence. Nay, so sure was He that
already He had spoken among His own, with prophetic
enthusiasm, of the immortalization of His memory.

Yet He never maintained He was the only mediator,
the only one in whom His idea actualized itself. All
who attach themselves to Him and form -His Church
should also be mediators with Him and through Him.
And He never made His school equivalent to His religion,
as if His idea were to be accepted on account of His
person, and not His person on account of His idea. Nay,
He would even suffer His mediatorship to be undecided, if
only the spirit, the principle from which His religion de-
veloped in Himself and others were not blasphemed.

His disciples also were far from confusing this school
with His religion, Pupils of the Baptist, still only very im-
perfectly initiated into the nature of Christianity, were,
without anything further, regarded and treated by the
apostles as Christians and reckoned genuine members of
the community. And it should be so still. Everyone who,
in his religion, sets out from the same cardinal point,
whether his religion originates from himself or from another,
is, without respect of school, a Christian. It will naturally
follow that when Christ with His whole efficacy is shown
him he must acknowledge Him, who has become historically
the centre of all mediation, the true Founder of redemption
and reconciliation." |

Nor did Christ say that the religious views and feelings
He Himself could communicate, were the whole extent of

THE RELIGIONS. 249

the religion that should proceed from this ground-feeling.
He always pointed to the living truth which, though only
“taking of His,” would come after Him. Similarly with
His disciples. They never set limits to the Holy Spirit.
His unbounded freedom and the absolute unity of His
revelations are everywhere acknowledged by them.

And when, the first bloom of Christianity being past
and it was appearing to rest from its works, those works,
so far as they were contained in the sacred scriptures, were
regarded as a finished codex of religion, it was only brought
about by those who took the slumber of the Spirit for death
—religion, as far as they were concerned, being dead. All
who still feel the life of religion in themselves or perceive
it in others, have ever protested against this unchristian
proceeding. The sacred scriptures have, by their native
power, become a bible, and forbid no other book to be or
to become abible. Anything written with like power they
would willingly allow to be associated with themselves. Nay,
should not every later utterance of the whole church,
and therefore of the Divine Spirit, append itself confidently,
even though there be ineffaceably in the first fruits of the
Spirit a special holiness and worth ? ”

In accordance with this unlimited freedom, this essential
infinity, then, this leading idea of Christianity of divine
mediating powers has in many ways been developed, and
all intuitions and feelings of the indwelling of the Divine
‚Being in finite nature have within Christianity been
brought to perfection. Thus very soon Holy Scripture in
which, in its own way, divine essence and heavenly power
dwelt, was held as a logical mediator to open for the know-
ledge of God the finite and corrupt nature of the under-
standing, while the Holy Spirit, in a later acceptation of
the word, was an ethical mediator, whereby to draw near
to the Deity in action. Nay,a numerous party of Christians
declare themselves ready to acknowledge everyone as a
mediating and divine being who can prove, by a divine life

250 FIFTH SPEECH.

or any impress of divineness, that he has been, for evena
small circle, the first quickening of the higher sense. To
others Christ has remained one and all, while others have
declared that their mediators have been their own selves
or some particular thing. Whatever failure there may.
have been in form and matter, the principle is genuinely
Christian, so long as it is free. Other human situations
have, in their relation to the central point of Christianity,
been expressed by feelings and represented by images, of
which there is no hint in the speeches of Christ or elsewhere
in the sacred books. Hereafter there will be more, for
the whole being of man is not yet by any means embodied
in the peculiar form of Christianity, but, despite of what
is said of its speedy, its already accomplished overthrow,
Christianity will yet have a long history.

For why should it be overthrown? The living spirit of
it, indeed, slumbers oft and long. It withdraws itself into
a torpid state, into the dead shell of the letter, but it ever
awakes again as soon as the season in the spiritual world
is favourable for its revival and sets its sap in motion.
Thus in oft repeated cycle it renews itself in various ways.
The fundamental idea of every positive religion, being a com-
ponent part of the infinite Whole in which all things must
be eternal, is in itself eternal and universal, but its whole
development, its temporal existence may not, in the same
sense, be either universal or eternal. For to put the centre
of religion just in that idea, it requires not only a certain
mental attitude, but a certain state of mankind. Is this
state, in the free play of the universal life, gone, never to
return, that relation which, by its worth, made all others
dependent on it, can no longer maintain itselfin the feeling,
and this type of religion can no more endure. This is the
case with all childlike religions, as soon as men lose the
consciousness of their essential power. They should be
collected as monuments of the past and deposited in the
magazine of history, for their life is gone, never to return.

THE RELIGIONS. 251

Christianity, exalted above them all, more historical and
more humble in its glory, has expressly acknowledged this
transitoriness of its temporal existence. A time will come,
it says, when there shall no more be any mediator, but the
Father shall be all in all. But when shall this time come ?
I, at least, can only believe that it lies beyond all time.

One half of the original intuition of Christianity is the
corruptibleness of all that is great and divine in human
things. If atime should come when this—I will not say
can no more be discovered, but no more obtrudes, when
humanity advances so uniformly and peacefully, that only
the navigator who calculates its course by the stars knows
when it is somewhat driven back on the great ocean it
traverses by a passing contrary wind, and the unarmed eye,
looking only at what is taking place, can no more directly
observe the retrogression of human affairs, I would gladly
stand on the ruins of the religion I honour.

The other half of the original Christian faith is that
certain brilliant and divine points are the source of every
improvement in this corruption and of every new and closer
union of the finite with the Deity. Should a time ever
come, when the power that draws us to the Highest was so
equally distributed among the great body of mankind, that
persons more strongly moved should cease to mediate for
others, I would fain see it, I would willingly help to level
all that exalteth itself. But this equality of all equalities
is least possible. Times of corruption await all human
things, even though of divine origin. New ambassadors
from God will be required with exalted power to draw the
recreant to itself and purify the corrupt with heavenly fire,
and every such epoch of humanity is a palingenesis of
Christianity, and awakes its spirit in a new and more
beautiful form.

And if there are always to be Christians, is Christianity,
therefore, to be universal and, as the sole type of religion,
to rule alone in humanity? It scorns this autocracy.

252 FIFTH SPEECH.

Every one of its elements it honours enough to be willing
to see it the centre of a whole of its own. Not only would
it produce in itself variety to infinity, but would willingly
see even outside all that it cannot produce from itself.
Never forgetting that it has the best proof of its immor-
tality in its own corruptibleness, in its own often sad
history, and ever expecting a redemption from the imper-
fection that now oppresses it, it willingly sees other and
younger, and, if possible, stronger and more beautiful types
of religion arise outside of this corruption. It could see
them arise close beside it, and issue from all points even
from such as appear to it the utmost and most doubtful
limits of religion. The religion of religions cannot collect
material enough for its pure interest in all things human.
As nothing is more irreligious than to demand general uni-
formity in mankind, so nothing is more unchristian than
to seek uniformity in religion.

In all ways the Deity is to be contemplated and wor-
shipped. Varied types of religion are possible, both in
proximity and in combination, and if it is necessary that
every type be actualized at one time or another, it is to be
desired that, at all times, there should be a dim sense of
many religions. The great moments must be few in which
all things agree to ensure to one among them a wide-
extended and enduring life, in which the same view is
developed unanimonsly and irresistibly in a great body, and
many persons are deeply affected by the same impression
of the divine. Yet what may not be looked for froma
time that is so manifestly the border land between two
different orders of things? If only the intense crisis were
past, such a moment might arrive. Even now a prophetic
soul, such as the fiery spirits of our time have,” turning its
thoughts to creative genius, might perhaps indicate the
point that is to be for the future generations the centre for
their fellowship with the Deity. But however it be, and
however long such a moment may still linger, new develop-

THE RELIGIONS. 253

ments of religion, whether under Christianity or alongside
of it, must come and that soon, even though for a long
time they are only discernible in isolated and fleeting mani-
festations. Out of nothing a new creation always comes
forth, and in all living men in whom the intellectual life
has power and fulness, religion is almost nothing. From
some one of the countless occasions it will be developed in
many and take new shape in new ground. Were but the
time of caution and timidity past! Religion hates loneli-
ness, and in youth especially, which for all things is the time
of love, it wastes away in a consuming longing. When it
is developed in you, when you are conscious of the first
traces of its life, enter at once into the one indivisible
fellowship of the saints, which embraces all religions and in
which alone any can prosper. Do you think that because
the saints are scattered and far apart, you must speak to
unsanctified ears? You ask what language is secret
enough—is it speech, writing, deed, or quiet copying of the
Spirit? All ways, I answer, and you see that I have not
shunned the loudest. In them all sacred things remain
secret and hidden from the profane. They may gnaw at
the shell as they are able, but to worship the God that is in
you, do you not refuse us,

EXPLANATIONS OF THE FIFTH SPEECH.

(1) Page 213.—As the question of the multiplicity of religion and
unity of the church, treated in earlier passages, is here expressed in
short compass, I would take the occasion to add something to the ex-
planations of this seemingly paradoxical statement. First, in every
type of faith it is the narrower brethren who would make the society
so exclusive, that on the one hand they would absolutely take no part
in the religious exercises of other types of faith, and would remain in
entire ignorance of their nature and spirit; and on the other, for the
slightest deviation, they are ready to found a distinct society. The
more liberal and noble again seek to have an affectionate apprecia-
tion of the mind of strange fellow believers, not only as spectators,
but as far as may be by active participation in the divine services
that have as their chief purpose the exhibition of this mind. Had
this not taken place among the members of the two Evangelical
churches, there could not be, even where they most mingle, any
thought now, more than three hundred years ago, of union. A
Catholic could more easily be edified by the whole Evangelical service,
in which he would only miss much that in another way is made up to
him, than a Protestant with the Catholic service which, as it exhibits
in the most positive way the difference between the two types of faith,
cannot be the expression of his own. Even fora Protestant, however,
there is a way oftaking part in much, by recasting, adjusting, trans-
lating in one’s own heart, that is not indifferentism. Only the Pro-
testant who has done this can boast of understanding the Catholic
type, and of having guarded his own faith when put to the touch-stone
of contrast. This leads us to the second point. The endeavour to
found an all-embracing society is the true and blameless principle of
tolerance. Though the possibility of such a society may be remote
if you take it quite away, nothing would remain but to regard the
different types of religion as an unavoidable evil. It is just like the
mutual toleration between differently constituted states. It continues

EXPLANATIONS. 255

because intercourse is still possible. When this ceases intolerance
enters, and a supposed right is assumed to interfere in the affairs
of other people. This can only be done by an act, by a government,
taking outward destructive action, and never by reasoning or even
by plausibility. Only the narrow-minded, however, assume such a
right. The more liberal seek everywhere to open up intercourse, and
to make manifest thereby the unity of the human race. Their love
to the constitution of their Fatherland does not in the least suffer,
and in religion also true tolerance is far removed from all in-
differentism.

(2) Page 220.—This expression savours strongly of the time when this
book was written. There was then no great common interest: every man
estimated his own condition according to his individual circumstances,
without the smallest trace of public spirit; and the French Revolu-
tion itself, though already it had largely developed as a historical
event, was regarded by us in a way thoroughly selfish and in the
highest degree different and vacillating. Only at a later time, in
the days of calamity which were the days of glory, did we again learn
the power of common sentiments, and then the consciousness and
the consolation of common piety returned. At present the patriotic
and the religious sentiment may easily be measured by each other.
Where empty words, instead of the deed looked for, are given in the
concerns of the Fatherland, piety is also empty, however zealous its
pretence; and where the interest in the improvement of our condi-
tion breaks up into morbid factions, piety again degenerates into
sectarianism. Itappearsthenthat a quickening of natural, healthy
public spirit contributes more to clearness in religion than all critical
analysis. As is indicated by what follows in the Speech, analysis,
wanting this impulse, is too apt to become sceptical. When the
great social interests are weakened, piety is lamed and perplexed.
Hence the religious societies that have a tendency to obscurity, do
well to keep clear of all contact with other forms of religion.

(3) Page 221.—I have made slight changes here, rejecting a capri-
cious play on words that I might be more historical. The manifold
divisions of one and the same type of faith are manifestly not all of
equal worth. Such as recast the whole in a characteristic way have
a natural worth, and have a good right to exist. All splits, however,
about single points of small importance, as most of the separations
from the great body of the church in the first centuries, owe their
existence simply to the obstinacy of the minority. While they
deviate in one point they may not, however, unless kept in breath
by persistent polemies, neglect the rest. Those only are most called

256 FIFTH SPEECH.

sects, and deserve only a name that indicates willing exclusion who
absorb themselves in a few devious views and allow all the rest to
grow strange. Such sects always rest on one narrow but forcible
personality.

(4) Page 222.—On the position assigned to this difference I hope
I have already sufficiently declared myself. This representation, how-
ever, of the antithesis between the personal and the pantheistic, as
going through all three stages, gives me an opportunity to explain the
matter from another side. In the polytheistic stage this antithesis is
undeniable, only it is less clear asin everything imperfect antitheses are
less pronounced. Even when all that is known of their history is put
together, most of the gods of Hellenic mythology have little unity.
For explanation it is necessary to go back to the rise of their service
to their different countries and the character of the myths there pre-
valent. The personality being slight, the forms readily become
symbolical. Many of foreign origin have received native names and
are quite symbolical, such as the Ephesian Diana, which is a pure
representation of the universal life, natura naturans, the direct
opposite of the idea of personality. In the Egyptian and Indian
systems the basis is either symbolic or hieroglyphic, and there is no -
personality underneath. Such a purely symbolical representation of
first causes has properly no conscious gods, but isreally pantheistic.
The dramatic or epic representation of the relation of the symbolic
or hieroglyphic being, however, produces an appearance of personality.
The two forms of polytheism, the personal and pantheistic, thus
appear to mingle, but in principle they are easy to distinguish.
Analogy would show that the same antithesis exists in the chaotic
stage or fetichism. Here, however, it is more difficult to recognize
and exhibit, there being but larve of the gods which only by a later
development become psychic.

(5) Page 222.—I include in naturalism all the forms of religion
usually known as worship of nature. They are all, in the sense given
above, impersonally polytheistic. The worship of the stars is not an
exception, Even the worship of the sun is only apparently mono-
theistic, for a wider knowledge of the system of the world must at
once reduce it to worship of the stars, and, therefore, to polytheism.
This departure from common usage has the disadvantage that the
words naturalist and naturalism are employed among us for some-
thing quite different. I can only defend myself by hoping that
every reader who does not think of the ancient usage, but of the
present connection, will easily understand the expression employed
and find it appropriate. Still I would have refrained, if the manner

EXPLANATIONS. 257

in which naturalism and rationalism were used almost synonymously
as the opposite of supernaturalism had not even then so much dis-
pleased me. Even at that time I had the opinion, to which I have since
given expression on different occasions, that it caused confusion.
There is some sense, and more perhaps than is usually thought, in
opposing reason to revelation, but there is no ground for a contrast
between nature and revelation. For this antithesis the biblical
foundation, to which a Christian will always return, entirely fails,
and the more a matter is discussed from such a standpoint the more
perplexed it will become.

(6) Page 222.—The expectation that some polytheistic religions
would yet develope was not expressed at random. It rested on the
view also hinted at in the Introduction to my “ Glaubenslehre,” that
many polytheistic systems have manifestly arisen from smelting to-
gether small idolatrous clan religions, and that they are of higher
value than their elements. As long as races exist that have only a
fetich worship such an occurrence is possible, and at a time when
Christian missions had almost gone to sleep, I regarded this as the
natural road to improvement for the most rude societies. This pro-
bability has since greatly diminished, and ithas grown more likely
that they also can be taken hold of directly by Christianity.

(7) Page 223.—At one time the expression heretic was honourable
Among the Greeks the schools of the philosophers and physicians,
the home of all the science and art of the time, were so called.
And to come nearer to our subject the different dogmatic schools
of the Jews also bore among the Hellenists the same name. In
ecclesiastical language the established faith of the church is no longer
the orthodox or catholic heresy. Yet the exclusive use of the word
for what is to be rejected does not rest on etymology. Probably it
has arisen because with a different reference it is used in this bad
sense in scripture. Here I use it of the positive religions in the
sense in which it was used of the Hellenic schools, which together
contained the whole national philosophy. It must bea bad philo-
sophical system indeed that has not caught some truly philosophic
element, and in some way sought to refer to it all other elements. The
‚same holds of the positive religions, and we may conclude that if
they were all developed there would be contained in the sum of them
the whole religion of the human race.

(8) Page 224,—This make is, of course, to be understood with a certain
limitation. In writing it I lived in the good confidence that every
one would complete it for himself. For example, it could not be my

meaning that he alone is a true Christian who could himself have
Ss

258 FIFTH SPEECH.

been Christ had not Christ already been before him. But this must
be admitted, that any man is a Christian only in so far as in pre-
christian times he would among the Jews have held and transmitted
the messianic idea, and among the heathen been convinced of the in-
sufficiency of sensuous idolatry, only in so far as, by the feeling of
his need for redemption, Christianity had attracted him and drawn
him to itself. What follows shows clearly enough how little I was
serious with the statement that some or perhaps many could have
the germs of quite new types of religion outside of the historical
forms, and that it should be their duty to bring them to the light.

(9) Page 226.—Though I hope this passage, in its connection, could
not easily be misunderstood, I would not leave it without a slight
correction of both sense and expression. The expression has a
certain appearance of giving countenance to the idea that it is
possible, in the sphere of religion to proceed to discovery or by set
purpose to produce something. Everything thatis new, in particular
if it is to be true and unadulterated, must issue spontaneously, as
by inspiration, from the heart. This appearance, however, will not
deceive those who hold fast the expression and the connection of the
whole. In the second place, the sense appears to be presented too
broadly and with too little regard to the great difference in various
forms of religion. Every religion of the highest stage, and especially
one that has constructed for itself a complete theology, must be in
a position to review its whole domain. It is the business of systematic
theology to draw such a map of it, that not only everything that has
come to actuality in that form of religion finds its place, but that
every possible place be indicated. And when such a map is looked
at, we will not easily find any place empty, only some parts better
filled, some less. None but subordinate forms of religion and
smaller sects fail to aim at completeness. I have already shown
why these sects have a natural inclination not to deal with the
whole mass of religious matter, and in the smaller religious forms
individuals may differ too little to be able fully to complete one
another. .

(10) Page 228.—This book bears throughout the marks of opposition,
and those who can call up that time will easily see that I am here
chiefly defending the cause of those who refer the beginning of their
religious life to one definite moment. Yet this is by no means a
mere attempt to reduce the opponents of this view to silence, in the
good assurance that they could not defend themselves. Singularly
I have had to defend this position against an able man, now long
departed, who was a distinguished teacher in a religious society I

EXPLANATIONS. 259

greatly value, and whose whole practice really rested on this assump-
tion of definite moments of grace. Heasked me if I actually believed
in such moments and considered them necessary, so that a gradual
imperceptible growth of religious life would not suffice me. He raised
an objection from an experience that must have struck all attentive
readers of the lives of men who have been awakened. They have
moments when they receive the assurance of divine grace, when
they are born to a personal, individual religious life. But, sooner
or later, to most of them times of relaxation come, when this cer-
tainty is again lost. Moments of confirmation must follow, and it
may be easily doubted whether the first or the second experience
is the true commencement. From this doubt it follows that the
truth is only in the gradual progress which the first moment pre-
pared for, and the second and third confirmed. I reminded him of what
I would here again recall, that I did not consider this the only form,
but acknowledged also the imperceptible rise and growth. The inner
truth, however, I held to bethe union of both, one being more promi-
nent in one case and the other in another. It was, however, one
thing to postulate such moments and another to require that every-
one should be able to specify it and have consciousness of the time.
This idea I have further developed in a sermon. Thus we came to
agree. To the way, however, in which the matter is here presented
as an extraordinary moment with each life produced from it neces-
sarily quite individual, two objections may be raised. First, even in
the early times of the church, by the preaching of the apostles, there
were Christian awakenings in large numbers together, and even yet,
at times, not only among members of other faiths, but particularly
among Christians whose piety has succumbed to worldly cares and
occupation, such awakenings are, as it were, epidemic, and cannot,
therefore, be regarded as extraordinary. Wherefore, secondly, it
is probable that all it produces is not extraordinary and individual,
more especially as these awakenings often appear as reactions
against uniform, extensive indifference and licentiousness. This con-
clusion is supported by experience. At different times we find, just
among those who hold by such authentic decisive moments, only one
wearisomely uniform type of piety and the same, somewhat confused
phraseology about the state of the soul that is conjoined with it. But
this is connected with the uncertainty of those moments, and it is
not in this sense that I contrast a life suddenly awaked with a life
gradually developed. In a gradual development, the common
elements dominate. By their power the individual elements are
moulded and subordinated. Characteristic features are rarer and

s 2

260 FIFTH SPEECH,

less pronounced. But the religiousness that rests apparently on a
moment of awakening has the same character. Even those who effect
the conversions have usually only one traditional type, which, from
its very limitation to a few strong formulas, is fitted to arouse the
indifferent, whether they are callous or have suffered defeat. Just
because their view requires such a moment, their persistent demand
actually prepares for it. By the repetition of such moments, though
only in a quite general and originally passing manner, consciousness
of personal worthlessness and of divine grace increase together,
and a religious life is gradually established. This is the undeniable
blessing that rests on this method. Yet the life adheres rigidly to
that type, and is consequently careful and troubled and but sparingly
equipped. If persons having such a history remain modestly in their
own circle, they are for us worthy comrades. ‘ When they are highly
cultured in an earthly sense and find themselves happy in this stage
of religion, it is a phenomenon both elevating and humbling. But
it is to none of those persons I refer here, for they have not developed
an individual life. The moments I refer to are of quite a different
stamp. ‘They come to pass only where a religious tendency exists,
though chaotic and indefinite. They are not the result of external
influences, rather they are prepared for by the ever renewed feeling
that everything offered from without is precarious and inadequate.
By quiet thought and aspiration the positive is fashioned from that
negative, the inmost self is taken hold of by the diyine, and then,
comprehending itself, it more or less suddenly comes forth. These
are rare occurrences, but even the most careless observer cannot
deceive himself into believing that he can exhaustively describe them
by one general name.

(11) Page 235.—Of course it is not new revelations outside the
circuit of any given religion that are here meant. A longing for such
revelations could not exist in any positive religion, for even its long-
ing must naturally bear its own characteristic form. Even the
messianic hopes of the Jews were not a longing for something beyond
Judaism, though they were afterwards fulfilled by the appearing of
Christ. In the measure of its vitality every religion has a desire to
find in itself something divine yet unknown. Hence the historical —
consistency of any faith that is to have an extended influence for a
long time is determined by its possession of some principle to which
everything new may be referred. Where this fails unity tends to
dissolution. Even if despite this principle there should still be
divisions the largest sections will abide by it. In this sense we can
say the strife between the Greek and Roman Churches is between

ye EXPLANATIONS. 261

the original and the translation, and that the strife between them
both and the Evangelical Church is between scripture and tradi-
tion.

(12) Page 235.—On similar grounds this passage requires a slight
explanation. It might appear as if the great historical religions
were put in the shade and the noteworthy sought only in smaller
modifications. In the political sphere, indeed, we are somewhat
accustomed to such a procedure. Many constitutions of great
peoples appear to us clumsy or insignificant, while the form of govern-
ment of single towns with small dominion are admired and studied
by historians as masterpieces of political art. But it is otherwise
in the religious sphere. A strong religious life, evenif hedged in by
narrow forms, sooner or later breaks through the limits of nationality.
This even Judaism did, and nothing in this sphere with character
and strength can remain small for ever. But I am speaking here
especially of what takes place within the great forms of religion,
particularly Christianity. Here it is quite otherwise. What most
easily finds an entrance with the multitude becomes great and
extended, which is usually that mean between extremes which
is only to be reached by active attention on every side. Now
this involves to some extent a direction of the attention without,
that does not encourage an inward and characteristic develop-
ment. This is the dominant character of what in the ancient sense
of the word we call catholic. As this is chiefly thought of when
the character and development of Christianity are under discussion,
it seemed to me right to direct the attention of earnest inquirers
away from what impresses by its size to what was smaller. But it
was less to heretical parties that are marked by special 'partialities
than to individuals in the greater church who cannot manage to
adhere to mediocrity, or if you will to circumspection, whereby alone
the individual retains a distinguished place among the catholic, but
who prefer their inward freedom, and are not vexed by obscurity.

(13) Page 237.—It has never seriously been my opinion that the
doctrine of ethics should everywhere be one and the same. It will
suffice, if I here adduce what is universally accepted. It appears
to me that morality never can be everywhere the same, as all times
witness that it never has been. Its form is essentially speculative,
and never can be the same till speculation in general is everywhere
the same. Of this, despite the great fruitfulness of the last centuries
in philosophy of universal validity, there is not yet any appearance.
Nor can its content be the same, even if everyone who dealt with
ethics set out from pure humanity, for he only sees it through the

262 FIFTH SPEECH, .

medium of his age and his personality. Wherefore, any doctrine of
morals of universal application can contain only the most general
truths in formulas of varying worth. Hence the universal application
is always rather apparent than real. Still the position here main-
tained is so far right,in that ethics applies another standard to
these differences than religion. It begins by subordinating the
individual and therefore the characteristic to the general. Only
by this subordination does the characteristic gain a right to make
itself valid. Suppose it possible to have as correct or even exactly the
same system built on the opposite mode of procedure, it would never
reach the universal feeling and anywhere give it effect. In religion
on the contrary, everything issues from the individual life, and the
more individual the more effective, and all common elements arise
simply from observing affinity and connection. Hence many who
are not yet conscious of their difference can adhere to one kind
of religion. Many, even when they are conscious of their difference, if
only their apprehension of human relations is the same, may, it is true,
accept one doctrine of morals, yet there may be found among the
adherents of one religion such marked difference that it is impossible
for them to have even a common moral doctrine.

(14) Page 246.—Nothing betrays less sense of the nature of Chris-
tianity and of the person of Christ Himself than the view that John has
mixed much of his own with the speeches of Jesus. It even betrays
small historical sense and understanding of what brings great events
in general to pass, and of the nature the men must have on whom they
are founded. This assertion was formerly but a whisper, but after
strengthening itself in quiet, and providing itself with critical weapons,
it makes a bolder venture, and now John did not write the gospel at
all, but a later writer invented this mystic Christ. But we are left
to find out for ourselves how a Jewish rabbi of philanthropic dis-
position, somewhat Socratic morals, a few miracles, or what others
took for miracles, and a talent for striking apothegms and parables,
a man to whom, according to the other evangelists, some follies will
have to be forgiven, a man who could not have held water to Moses
and Mahommed, could have had such an effect as to produce a new
religion and a newchurch. Butthis must be fought out in a learned
manner, and the friends and adorers of the Johannine Son of God are
doubtless already girding themselves. The sadness of the Christians
of which I have spoken can be traced in Christ in the other evange-
lists also, as soon we learn to understand them rightly through
John. I have said that this sadness is the ground-tone in the pride
as in the humility of the Christian. It may appear that, though it

EXPLANATIONS, 263

is generally agreed that something exists which may be described as
pride which is not to be blamed, it is somewhat venturesome to call it
a Christian state of mind. In the Christian disposition, humility
is so essential and so predominant, that in this sphere it does not
appear as if there could be anything resembling pride, even though
in civil morals we would not blame it. I will not shield myself by
saying that I have also put fear and love together. As love is the
‘mark of the Christian, and perfect love casts out fear, I might say
that I was thinking of a human, that is an imperfect state of things.
But my meaning was this. There must be distinguished in the
Christian his personal consciousness over against Christ from his
personal consciousness in fellowship with Christ. The former, even
after the divine spirit of goodness has accomplished much in him,
can be nothing but humility, but the later, consisting in the acquisi-
tion of all Christ’s perfections, must be of quite the opposite nature.
Now I know no other term that would express the contrast more
strongly. To point out this feeling I only need to recall all the
glorification of the Christian church in our New Testament books.
But that even in this pride there should be sadness about the still
narrow limits in which fellowship with Christ is actually felt, is a
matter of course.

(15) Page 248.—It is always dangerous, especially as here before un-
believers, to rest faith in Christ on any onethingin Him. Something
apparently similar may only too readily be compared with it, and its
inner and essential difference may not be easy to detect. Many an
enthusiast has thought greatly of himself and died in that faith.
How often has an error been defended with the firmest conviction
at the risk of life! Such a rooted error, if indeed the proper object
of the faith is not the truth to which the error has attached itself,
rests only on an idiosyncrasy which cannot extend far. But of this
self-consciousness of Christ, the faith of the whole company of His
disciples and the joy of all the martyrs of this faith are the reflection.
Such a power the self-deception of any one soul never exercised.
Consider also that this claim did not have to do merely with inner
phenomena of the consciousness about which men could easily deceive
themselves, nor with some prospect in the distant future, which offers
free play to fancy. Christ had to believe that, under unfavourable
circumstances, open and easily surveyed, the divine power of this
abiding consciousness would approve itself. Still the vindication of
faith by any one thing is always incomplete, and to attempt to plant
it thereby in another is always hazardous.

(16) Page 248.—The conclusion of this exposition that, Christ is the

NE Se a a — =m

a

264 FIFTH SPEECH.

centre of all mediation, should connect all the details in it and com-
plete what appears insufficient. Still I would not have the reader
overlook what I wish to make prominent. At that time the distinc-
tion between the teaching of Christ and the teaching about Christ
was hailed as a great discovery. Even allowing its validity to some
extent, the idea of mediation must in every way be reckoned the
teaching of Christ. Our teaching about Christ is nothing but the
ratification and application of that teaching of Christ as it is
fashioned by faith and sealed by history. And if I distinguish His
school from His religion it is only, as the conclusion shows quite
clearly, a different consideration of the same matter from different
points of view. The religion of Christ is that the idea of redemption
and mediation is the centre of religion. The application, so far,
however, as the reference of this idea to a person was a historical
process—and on this reference the whole historical existence of the
doctrine as well as of the society rests—I call, by an expression
now generally used, His school. That this was for Christ only
secondary appears from what is here adduced, and also from the fact
that at first the kingdom of God, and He who was to come was an-
nounced, and only afterwards He is spoken of as having come. Again,
when it is said further back that Christ has become a mediator for
many, it is to be remembered that Christ Himself said that “He
would give his life a ransom for many.” A particularist meaning is
not to be drawn from my words, or at least only in accordance with
my view set forth elsewhere. This is, that the actually experienced
relation of man to Christ is limited, and ever will be, even when
Christianity spreads over the whole earth. On the other hand, I
acknowledge a purely inward and mysterious relation of Christ
to human nature generally, which is absolutely general and un-

- limited.

(17) Page 249.—Many of the members of our church will perhaps
consider what is here said of the Scriptures to be Catholic, and
Catholics will consider it hyper-protestant; the constitution of the
Scriptures by the church not being acknowledged, but the volume
being declared not yet finished. This is said only in a tentative
way, to distinguish clearly the shell of the matter from the kernel.
If there could be a book from an author like Mark or Luke or Jude,
with all the marks of authenticity, we would hardly agree unani-
mously to receive it into the canon. Yet it would show its native
biblical power and be bible in fact. Just this power has been the
ground for determining the practice of the church, and the ecclesias-
tical deliverance only confirmed it. Howimperceptible the transition

EXPLANATIONS. 265

‘from the canonical to the apocryphal, and both in power and purity,

how in strength and beauty many productions of the church
approach the canonical, no Protestant with experience and love of
history will deny.

(18) Page 252.—This is not an addition which I now make for the
first time. It was meant for the second edition, but as it seemed to
me too much of a challenge I again erased it. Now that those times
are past, it can stand as a monument of the impression made on
me and doubtless on many. It was not that the surfeit of a sense-
less Christianity at that time appeared in many as irreligion, for it
was to the honour of Christianity that they believed that where
Christianity was nothing religion generally was nothing. But
among not a few there was an endeavour to provide for natural
religion, an external existence, a thing already shown in England
and France to be a vain endeavour. There was also an itch for
innovation that, dreaming of a symbolized or gnostic Heathenism,
of a return to ancient mythologies as of a new salvation, rejoiced at
the thought of seeing the fanatical Christ vanquished by the calm
and cheerful Zeus.

EPILOGUE.

Brrore parting with you, let me add a word about the con-
clusion of my Speech. Perhaps you think that it had
been better suppressed, because now, after several years, it
is apparent that I was wrong in adducing as a proof of
the power of the religious sentiment that it was in the act
of producing new forms. As nothing of the’ sort has any-
where come to pass, did I not wrongly presume to guess
what they would be? If you think so, you have forgotten
that prophecy only deserves its name, in so far, as it is the
first fore-runner of the future. It is an indication of what
is to be, and in it, to the eyes of the prophet’s kindred, the
future is already contained. But the more the thing pro-
phesied is great and comprehensive, and the more the pro-
phesying itself is in the genuine lofty style, the less can
the fulfilment be near. As in the far distance the setting
sun makes, from the shadows of great objects, vast magic
shapes on the grey east, prophecy sets up only in the far
distance the shapes of the future which it has fashioned
from the past and the present. Wherefore, what I said was
in no sense to be to you a sign to prove the truth of my
Speech, which should rather be clear to you by itself. I
had no wish to prophesy, even if the gift had not been
wanting, for it would have availed me nothing to point you ©
to a distant future.

All I wished was partly to demand, not of you, but of
some others, half in irony, whether they could perhaps pro-
duce that of which they appear to boast, and partly I hoped to

EPILOGUE. 267

lead you to trace for yourselves the course of the fulfilment.
I was sure you would there find, what I would willingly
show you, that, in the very type of religion, which in
Christianity you so often despise, you are rooted with your
whole knowing, doing and being. You would see that
you cannot get away from it, and that you seek in vain to
imagine its destruction without the annihilation of all that
you hold dearest and holiest in the world—your whole
culture and mode of life, your art and science.

From this it follows that, as long as our age endures,
nothing disadvantageous to Christianity can come forth,
either from the age or from Christianity itself, and from
‚all strife and battle it must issue renewed and glorified.
This was my chief purpose, and you can see that I could not
have meant to attach myself to some expressions of able
and superior men, from which you understand that they
wish to re-introduce the Heathenism of Antiquity, or even
to create a new mythology, and by it to manufacture a new
religion. In my opinion, rather, you can recognize, in the
way that everything connected with such an endeavour is
void and without result, the power of Christianity.

Above all, it is necessary that you understand what I
have said of the fortunes of Christianity. This is not the
place to expound and defend or even largely indicate my
views, but I shall make a simple explanation that may
prevent me from being classed, in the usual way of refer-
ring everything to schools and parties, with persons with
whom, in this respect at least, I have nothing in common.

From the first there has almost always been some pro-
nounced antithesis in Christianity. As is natural, it always
has a beginning, a middle, and an end. The hostile ele-
ments gradually separate, the division reaches a climax, and
then gradually subsides until it fully disappears in another
antithesis that has meantime been developing. This has
marked the whole history of Christianity, and at present
Protestant and Catholic are the dominant antithesis in

268 EPILOGUE.

Western Christendom. In each the idea of Christianity
has characteristic expression, so that, only by conjoining
both, can the historical phenomenon of Christianity corre-
spond to the idea of Christianity. This antithesis, I say, is _
still in operation and persists. Were I to interpret for
you the signs of the time, I would say it has reached the
turn of the tide, but has not appreciably diminished or disap-
peared.’ Let no one, therefore, be indifferent, but let every
man consider to what side he and his Christianity belong,
and in which church he can lead a religious and edifying
life. And none who are happy in having a healthy, strong
nature, and who follow it, can go astray.’

At present there are some who appear to rescue them-
selves from the Protestant into the Catholic Church. I am
not speaking of those who in themselves are nothing and
are dazzled like children by glitter and show, or are talked
over by monks. But there are some to whom I myself
have formerly drawn your attention who are somewhat-
able poets and artists who are worthy of honour; anda
host of followers, as is the fashion nowadays, has followed
them. The reason given is that in Catholicism alone there
is religion, and in Protestantism only irreligiousness, a
godlessness growing out of Christianity itself. Let that
man be honoured by me who ventures on such a step solely
on the conviction that he is following his nature. But if
his nature is only at home in that form of Christianity,
surely traces of this natural constitution will appear in his
whole life. It must be capable of proof that his act has
only completed outwardly what inwardly and spontaneously
was strictly contemporaneous and anterior.

There is another class also which I would pity and
excuse if I cannot honour. With the instinct of the sick,
which at times indeed is marvellously successful but may
also be dangerous, they take this step. Manifestly they
are in a state of dismay and weakness. Avowedly they
require external support for a bewildered feeling or some

EPILOGUE. 269

incantations to allay anxious dread and bad headache, or
they seek an atmosphere in which weak organs, being less
stimulated, would feel better, as many sick people must not
seek the free mountain air but the exhalations of animals.

But the persons to whom I now refer, are neither one
nor other, but, appear to me simply despicable, for they know
not what they wish nor what they do. Is there any sense
in what they say? Do the heroes of the Reformation
impress any uncorrupted mind with godlessness and not
with a truly Christian piety? Is Leo X. actually more pious
than Luther, and Loyola’s enthusiasm holier than Zinzen-
dorfs? And where are we to assign the greatest produc-
tions of modern times in every department of science, if
Protestantism is godlessness and hell ? And in the same way
that Protestantism is for them only irreligion, they love in
the Roman church not what is in any way characteristic
and essential, but only its corruption—a clear proof that
they know not what they wish. Consider this purely his-
torically, that the papacy is in no way the essence of the
Catholic Church, but its corruption.’

What they are really in search of is idolatry. The Pro-
testant Church, alas! has also to contend with idolatry, but
in a less gorgeous, and therefore less seductive form. And
because it is not pronounced and colossal enough here,
they seek it beyond the Alps. For what is an idol, if not
what can be made, touched, and broken with hands, and
which yet, in its perishableness and fragility, is foolishly and
perversely set up to represent the Eternal, not merely in
its own place, and according to its indwelling power and
beauty, but as if a temporal thing could be the Eternal,
as if the Eternal could be handled and magically weighed
and measured at pleasure. The highest they seek is this
superstition in church and priesthood, sacrament, absolu-
tion, and salvation. But they will accomplish nothing
thereby, for it is a perverse state of things and will show
itself in them through increased perversity. Leaving the

270 EPILOGUE,

common sphere of culture, they will rush into a vain and
fruitless activity, and the portion of art that God has lent
them will turn to foolishness. This, if you will, is a pro-
phecy, the fufilment of which lies near enough to be
expected.

And now one more prophecy of a different sort, and may
you, as I hope, also see its fulfilment. It refers to the
second point I have just touched upon, the persistence
of the opposition of the two parties. Unquestionably many
in the Romish Church have rid themselves of her corrup-
tions. Now it might happen that outwardly also this
should take place, if not everywhere, and in all things, yet in
alarge measure. Seducers might then come, threatening the
strong, and flattering the weak, persuading the Protestants
that, as this corruption is held by many to be the sole ground
of separation, they should return to the one, indivisible,
original church. Even that is a foolish and perverse pro-
ject. It may attract and terrify many, but it will not suc-
ceed, for the abolition of this opposition at present would
be the destruction of Christianity. I might challenge the
mightiest of the earth to attempt it. For him everything
is a game, and I would allow all power and guile. Yet I
prophesy he would fail and be put to shame, for Germany
still exists, and its invisible power is not weakened. Once
more it would take up its calling with unsuspected power
and would be worthy of its ancient heroes and its renowned
descent. It was chiefly appointed to develope this pheno-
menon, and, to maintain it, it would rise again with giant
force.*

Here you have a sign if you require it, and when this
miracle comes to pass you will perhaps believe in the living
power of religion and of Christianity. But blessed are they
by whom it comes to pass, who do not see and yet believe.

NOTES TO THE EPILOGUE.

(1) Page 268,—This deliverance wil] now appear less strange than it
did at first. At that time, looking from one side, it was easy to
believe that both churches would unite in unbelief, in indifferentism ;
from the other, that they would soon be two forms of superstition, only
outwardly and accidentally different. Lately, however, many events
have not only quickened the consciousness that the opposition still
actually exists, but have made it very clear what holds the two sections
apart. We cannot deny that the chief seat of the opposition is in
Germany. In England, indeed, it is strong enough, but it is more
political, in France again it plays a very subordinate part. It be-
comes us Germans above all to comprehend it both historically and
speculatively. This happens, alas ! too seldom. We have fallen sadly
into impassioned ways. If anyone among us would speak of the
matter impartially, he will certainly be suspected by his brethren as
a crypto-catholic, and he would be exposed to many importunate and
flattering advances from the Romanists. Praiseworthy exceptions,
when truly thorough-going moderation is acknowledged, are very
rare. Leaving quite aside, therefore, the present state of things,
I will indicate, in few words, wherein this opposition, regarded
from the point of view of its historical development, seems to me
still to exist. There is in both churches an evident disposition to be
exclusive, and as far as possible to ignore each other. Of this the
almost inconceivable ignorance of one another’s doctrine and usages
gives sufficient proof. This disposition is natural enough in the mass
of men, for each section finds religious stimulus and nourishment
enough in its own narrow circle, and the other section, though but
little may be wanting to it, appears, if not as impure as members of
alien religions to the Jews, at least utterly strange. This tendency
rules in quiet times. It is only interrupted in the mass of men by
outbreaks of passion, when one section gains some decisive advantage
in political matters or, in a large number of single cases in private

272 EPILOGUE.

life. As the educated, however, in whom a historical consciousness
should dwell, ought not to share this lazy exclusiveness, neither should
they share this hurtful passionateness. Between both churches there
should be a living influence, even though it should not be direct. Quiet
contemplation should stir up a keen rivalry in whatever in the other -
section is acknowledged to be good. The contrast in the character
of both churches involves at least that one is receptive of the imper-
fections that the other more suppresses. May the Catholics be edified
by seeing that the more prominently the religious tendency appears
among us, the more any return to any kind of barbarity is hindered.
And if they would not deceive themselves as though there were no
difference in this respect between us, let them see how far they can
advance in the demand for individual freedom. And we should, as
passionlessly as possible, observe the secure position which in all out-
ward matters the Catholic Church knows how to secure by strong
organization. Let us then try how far we can attain to unity and
coherence, yet it must be done in our own spirit and not by setting
the spiritual order over against the laity in a way quite opposed to
this spirit. Such healthy influences appear, and the results are seen
from time to time. But the lazy exclusiveness of the mass checks
them and all passionate moments interrupt them. It may there-
fore be long before the purpose of the disagreement is attained. Tull
then, we cannot say that the variance has reached its climax and
has begun to diminish. When that comes to pass, there will be a
common duty to exercise a vitalizing influence on the Greek Church.
As it is almost quite defunct, both churches will need for along time
to employ alltheir powers and all their remedies. But, until they have
succeeded in waking the dead, they cannot have fulfilled the destiny
of their division.

(2) Page 268.—How seldom anyone in lands belonging entirely to
one church, without interested views or artful suasion, but by a true
inward impulse, is driven to the other church is apparent. Inregions
where the two sects commingle, how calmly we educate the children
of parents of one faith in the paternal religion, and it does not in the
least occur to us that they may have an inward destination for the
other. As the different national character of Christian peoples was
not without influence on the course the Reformation took, should it
not be thought that this spiritual attitude is a matter of inheritance
or birth? And is not this confirmed by the fact that when the adhe-
rents of another faith come over to Christianity, we do not consider
the Christian sense pure and steadfast till after two generations.
For children of mixed marriages, therefore, the natural rule would

NOTES. 273

not be for the sons to follow the father and the daughter the mother,
but for each to follow the parent with whom there is more in-
‘herited resemblance. On the other side, however, it is not to be
denied that the original relation of the two churches is not favourable
to the hypothesis of a strictly innate inclination. It would rather
lead us to expect a self-determination for one or other form, according
to personal character. From this view the natural principle for
mixed marriages and the principle that without extraneous inter-
ference would have effect, would be for the children to follow the
more strongly religious parent. Under the special influence of this
parent, the religious element would be most strongly developed,
and then the child’s own choice could be calmly and hope-
fully waited for. Were there no foreign motives, no influences
that are almost violence, and were this natural course generally
followed, change in the prime of life would be rarer. After
a faith has been apprehended with love, and has for a long time
guided the life, this step is always the result and the cause of con-
fusion. It would be only taken by individuals who are in other
respects exceptions, as it were capricious sallies of nature, or by
persons who, from perverse guidance, have been made to see very
clearly the imperfection and narrowness of the accepted faith, and
are thereby driven to the opposite faith—a thing not rare at present
in both churches.

(3) Page 269.—Only a few will require a defence of this position,
that the Catholic Church, not merely in the old sense, but in the sense
we understand when we contrast it with the Evangelical Church, might
shake off the papal authority and return from the monarchical to the
aristocratic form of the episcopal system, without removing the differ-
ence between the churches, or, in any marked degree, facilitating their
union. Nor does it need much proof that the papal authority, whether
considered in its rise or in its prevailing tendency, has striven for aims
almost always false and beyond the church’s sphere. Itis noteworthy,
however, that almost all who fall away from our church become
strong papists. It is hardly possible to avoid the conclusion that
they have not apprehended the true character of the Catholic Church,
and are only destined to display their religious incapacity in two
different forms.

(4) Page 270.-—It would be bad if the very conclusion of a work could
cause a smile that might efface any earlier good impressions. Yet this
may doit in two respects. First, there is the dread that Bonaparte could
have some design against Protestantism, for did he not afterwards
threaten to go over with a large part of France to Protestantism,

EN

274 EPILOGUE,

and, quite recently, were not the Protestants in the south of France
persecuted as his most attached followers? Then, again, I
almost always speak as if all Germany were Protestant, and now

many are hoping that sooner or later it will be once more altogether

or almost Catholic. In respect of the former possibility, what I said
expressed too accurately our feelings in the years of ignominy that I
should not let it stand as I then wrote it. So much had been taken
from us that we might well fear that all was threatened. Undeniably
Napoleon acted in a quite different way in Protestant and in Catholic
Germany, and it could not remain hidden from him that our religious
sentiment and our political were intimately connected. On the
other point let everyone take heed not to laugh too soon. However
firmly he holds his hope, I hold mine as firmly. Further progress of
a Papistical Catholicism in Germany on many grounds necessarily
involves a return to every kind of barbarity. As the freedom of the
Evangelical Church will remain the surest support of every noble
endeavour, it cannot lie in the ways of Providence to weaken it and,
at its expense, to allow Catholicism to prevail.

¥

‘THE FIRST EDITION.

In the first chapter there are many changes, but for the
most part merely of single words and phrases. The com-
plimentary passage on us proud Islanders is even stronger
in its original form. ‘Religion can only be for us a dead
letter, a sacred article in the constitution without any
reality, for we are only occupied with fierce defence of
national orthodoxy and the maintenance of superstitious
attachment to ancient usages, while our pursuit of know-
ledge is limited to a miserable empiricism.’

P. 16, last par., has lost something of the irony of the
Romanticist. “We have systems from all schools, yea,
even from schools that are mere habitations and nurseries
of the dead letter. The spirit is neither to be confined in
academies nor to be poured out into a row of ready heads.
It evaporates usually between the first mouth and the first
ear.”

On p. 17, foot, beginning “In isolation,’ a somewhat
mighty figure has been weakened, doubtless as too youth-
fully daring. He is speaking of the work of the true
heroes of religion. ‘‘ Only single noble thoughts flash
through their soul, kindled with celestial fire. ‘lhe magic
thunder of an enchanting speech accompanied the high
phenomenon, and announced to adoring mortals that the
Deity had spoken. An atom impregnated with heavenly
power, fell into their soul, and there assimilated all, and
gradually expanded till it burst like a divine fate ina world
whose atmosphere offers too little resistance, and produced in

its last moments one of those heavenly meteors, one of

tT 2

276 THE FIRST EDITION.

those significant signs of the time, of the origin of which
none was ignorant, and with awe of which all mortals were
filled. You must seek this heavenly spark which is pro-
duced when a holy soul is stirred by the Universe, and you
must attend to it in the incomprehensible moment of its
formation.”

The earlier portion of the Second Chapter (pp. 26-66),
has been materially altered, a large part of it having been
entirely re-cast.. The opening passage is little altered, the
parallel drawn between the sociality of states and the com-
bining of the mental activities is only verbally different,
but it is used to explain that he frequently returns to more
childlike times, not from depreciation of the present but in
order to discover religion more by itself.

‘ Ultimately, metaphysics, morals and religion have the
same object, the Universe. This has led to confusion.
Yet your instinct and opinions are against making religion
one with metaphysics, for you do not admit that it can
tread with the same firm step, or with morals, for there are
foully immoral parts in its history. It must, therefore,
deal with the same matter in a different way. “What
does your metaphysics do, or, if you will not have that
antiquated, too historical name, your transcendental philo-
sophy? It classifies the Universe, gives the grounds for
what exists, deduces the necessity of the actual, and spins
from itself the reality and the laws of the world.” Religion,
however, has nothing to do with grounds and deductions
and first causes. “And what does your ethics do? It
developes from the nature of man and his relation to the
Universe a system of duties, it commands and prohibits
actions with absolute authority. But religion cannot
venture to use the Universe for the deduction of duties, or
to contain a code of laws.” The common idea of religion
is that it is a mixture of fragments of metaphysics and
ethics, but it is time this idea was quite annihilated.
“ The theorists in religion who seek to know the nature of

THE FIRST EDITION. 277

the Universe and of a Highest Being whose work it is, are
metaphysicians, but discreet enough not to despise a little
morals ; the practical persons, to whom the will of God is
the chief matter, are moralists, but a little in the meta-
physical style. They import the idea of the good into
metaphysics as the natural law of a Being without limits
and without wants, and they import the idea of an Original
Being from metaphysics into morals that the great work
should not be anonymous, but that such a glorious code
might be prefaced by a picture of the law-giver.’’ Were
this mixture anything more than a selection for beginners,
and had a principle of union of its own, religion must be
the highest in philosophy, and metaphysics and ethics only
sub-divisions. All these are found together even in the
sacred books, unavoidably and also of high design. But
religion is like the diamond in the clay, enclosed not to
remain hidden, but to be all the more surely found. It is
simply a device for subtle winnirg of the hearer, but it has
overstepped the mark when the shell conceals the kernel.
“] have been put out by your common idea, it is taken out
of the way I trust. Interrupt me now no more.”

‘““ Religion neither seeks like metaphysics to determine
and explain the nature of the Universe, nor like morals to
advance and perfect the Universe by the power of freedom
and the divine will of man. It is neither thinking nor act-
ing, but intuition and feeling. It will regard the Universe
as itis. It is reverent attention and submission, in child-
like passivity, to be stirred and filled by the Universe’s im-
mediate influences.” To metaphysics, man is the centre of
all, the condition of all existence ; to religion, he is, like
every other finite thing, but a manifestation of the
Universe. Morals proceeds from the consciousness of free-
dom and seeks to expand the realm of freedom to infinity ;
religion regards man as needing to be what he is, whether
he will or not. Religion, morals and metaphysics. are
equals, different but complementary. “To have specula-

278 THE FIRST EDITION.

tion and practice without religion is mad presumption,

audacious hostility to the gods, the unholy sense of
Prometheus, who faintheartedly stole what he might have
asked for in safety. Man has but stolen the feeling of his
infinity and likeness to God, and as unjust goods he cannot
prosper with it, for he must also be conscious of his
limits,”

“Practice is art, speculation is science, religion is sense
and taste for the Infinite.’ Without religion, practice
cannot get beyond venturesome or traditional forms, and
speculation is only a stiff and lean skeleton. ‘ Practice
opposes man to the Universe, not having received him as a
part of it from the hand of religion. It has, in consequence,
a miserable uniformity, knows only one ideal and forgets
to cultivate man himself. The feeling for infinite and
living nature is wanting, whereof the symbol is variety and
individuality.” And why has speculation so long given
delusions for a system and words for thoughts? From
want of religion. “ All beginning must be from intuition
of the Universe, and if the desire to have intuition of the
Infinite is wanting, there is no touchstone and there is
need of none, to know whether anything has been rightly
_ thought. Modern Idealism is in need of religion, p. 40.

On intuition of the Universe my whole Speech hinges.
It is the highest formula of religion, determining its nature
and fixing its boundaries. “All intuition proceeds from
the influence of the thing perceived on the person perceiv-
ing. The former acts originally and independently, and the
latter receives, combines and apprehends in accordance with
its nature.” Without mechanical or chemical affection of
the organs, there is no perception. ‘ What is perceived is
not the nature of things, but their action upon us, and what
is known or believed of this nature is beyond the range
of intuition. The Universe is in unbroken activity, and
reveals itself to us at every moment. Every form, every
creature, every occurrence is an action of the Universe upon

~

THE FIRST EDITION. 279

us, and religion is just the acceptance of each separate thing
as a part of the Whole, of each limited thing as an
exhibition of the Infinite. What would go further and
penetrate deeper into the nature and substance of the
Whole, is no more religion, and if it will nevertheless be
taken for religion, it invariably sinks into vain mythology.”
Then follows, almost unchanged, the passage on p. 49, about
what in the ancient world was religion, and what was
mythology.

Intuition is always single and distinct. Union and
arrangement into a whole are not the business of sense but
of abstract thinking. For religion, each intuition and
feeling is unconnected and independent, immediate and
true by itself. As the Universe can be viewed from an
infinite number of points of view, there can be no system.
There can no more be a system of intuitions than of the
stars. ‘The only system among them is the primitive en-
deavour to group them in definite but wretched and in-
appropriate figures. You may sketch the wain on the blue
scroll of the worlds, but your neighbour is free to enclose
them in quite other outlines. “ This infinite chaos, where
each point is a world, is the best and highest emblem of
religion.” At ‘each different point of the material world
you see a new arrangement that leaves no trace of your
arbitrary figures, and there are new objects within your ken.
No horizon could embrace all, and there could be no eye
which nothing could escape. In religion, from each different
point of view you will see new intuitions and different
groupings of the old. ‘he infinity of speculation is in the
endless variety of action and passion between the same
limited matter and the mind; the infinity of morals is the
impossibility of inward completeness; but religion is not
only infinite in these respects, it is infinite on every side, in
matter and in form and in way of perception.

The passage (pp. 54-56) follows little altered.

“But to complete the general sketch of religion, recol-

280 THE FIRST EDITION.

lect that each intuition, from its very nature, is linked to a
feeling. Your organs mediate the connection between the
object and yourselves. The influence of the object that
reveals its existence to you, must stimulate them in various
ways, and produce a change in your inner consciousness, —
Frequently itis hardly perceived. In other circumstances it
becomes so violent that you forget both the object and your-
selves.” Yet, even then, you will not ascribe the activity
of your spirit that has been set in motion, to the influence
of external objects. “ ‘Thus also in religion the same opera-
tion of the Universe, whereby it reveals itself in the finite,
brings it also into a new relation to your mind and to your
state.” With the intuition you must necessarily have many
feelings. The intuition does not, indeed, as in perception,
preponderate so much over the feeling, but the eternal world
may, like the sun, dazzle the eyes, casting its image and its
splendour long after on all objects.

The kind of intuition of the Universe determines the type
of your religion, the strength of feeling, its degree. The
sounder the sense, the more clearly and definitely will each
impression be apprehended ; the more ardent the thirst,
the more persistent the impulse to be always and every-
where impressed by the Universe, the more easy, perfect
and dominant will the impressions be. The feelings of reli-
gion should possess us and we should give them expression,
but if they urge us to action, we are in another sphere.
If you will still consider it religion, however good the
action, it is only superstition. All actions must be moral,
religion accompanying as a sacred music, “all should be
done with religion, nothing from it.” And even though
you do not admit that all actions are moral, the same is
true of those you exclude. The moralist, the politician,
the artist must all act with calmness and discretion, not a
possible thing if man is impelled to action by the violent
feelings of religion. Religion, without any other impulse
to activity, rather tends to inactive contemplation. To act

THE FIRST EDITION. 281

on the Whole by feeling direct from the Whole, would be
like acting towards a man according to the immediate
impression he makes upon us. Morals condemns it
because it gives room for alien motives, and religion
because it makes man cease to be what gives him religious
value—a part of the Whole acting by its own free power.
Action proceeding from its own proper source with the
soul full of religion, is the aim of the pious. Action from
religion is the impulsion of bad spirits not good. The
legion of angels with which the Father prow ied the Son
were around Him not in Him.

The next matter to understand is intuitions and feelings.
For clear consciousness, reflection and utterance they must
be considered apart, but the finest spirit of religion is there-
by lost. In our original consciousness there are two activi-
ties, one controlling and working outwards, and another
subservient, sketching and copying. Straightway in the
simplest matter the elements divide, one set combines into
an image of the object and the other penetrating to the cen-
tre of our being, dashes itself upon our original impulses
and developes a fleeting feeling. In the same way no
creation of the religious sense can escape this fate of divi-
sion. Yet intuition without feeling is nothing, and feeling
without intuition is nothing. There isa mysterious moment
in every sense perception, before intuition and feeling
divide, when sense and object mingle and are one. “ It
is fleeting and indescribable, but I wish you could seize it
and recognize it again in the higher, the divine religious
activity of the spirit.”

This moment is a kiss, an embrace, pp. 43, 44. Without
it religion is but a spinning of formulas, pp. 47, 48.

The divine life is like a tender plant, the flowers of which
are fertilized in the bud. ‘The holy intuitions and feelings
that you can dry and preserve are but the calixes and
corollas that soon open and soon fall. But out of them I
would now wind a sacred wreath.

282 THE FIRST EDITION.

First I conduct you to Nature as the outer court. The
first intuition of the world and its Spirit is neither from fear
of material forces nor from joy at physical beauty. Both
had their place in preparing rude peoples, and may yet
through art have a higher influence, but these influences
naturally diminish with civilization, (p. 64) one god being
made to conquer another, and the beauties of the globe
being seen to be for universal matter pure delusion.
“ At a higher stage, perhaps, we shall see that to which
here we must submit, ruling universally in all the vault of
heaven, and a sacred awe will fill us at the unity and
universality of material forces, and we may some time
discover with astonishment: in this delusion the same
Spirit that quickens the Whole.”

After p. 66 the alterations are less extensive. _

On p. 93 the section on the idea of God has been re-cast,
and some think entirely changed.

‘For me the Deity is only one kind of religious intui-
tion, of which any others there may be, are independent.
I do not accept the position, ‘ No God, no religion.’

The idea of God may be very different. To most men
God is merely the genius of humanity, man being the
prototype. To this God mankind is everything, and
His disposition and nature are determined by what man
takes to be His doings and dealings. But to me mankind is
not everything, but an infinitely small part, a fleeting form
of the Universe. There may be many beings above hu-
manity, but every race and individual is subordinated to
the Universe. Can God in this sense then be anything for
me but one type of intuition ?

Let us proceed to the highest idea, a Highest Being, a
Spirit of the Universe who rules with freedom and under-
standing. On this idea also religion is not dependent. To
have religion is to have an intuition of the Universe, and
while this idea of God suits every intuition, a religion
without God might still be better than another with God.

THE FIRST EDITION. 283

The stages of religion depend on the sense, the idea of God
on the direction of the imagination. “ If your imagination
attach itself to the consciousness of freedom so that it
cannot think of what originally operates on it, except as a
free being, you will personify the Spirit of the Universe and
havea God. Ifit attach itself to understanding, so that
you always clearly perceive that freedom has only meaning
in the individual and for individuals, then you have a World
and no God. You will not I trust consider it blasphemy
that the belief in God should depend on the direction of the
imagination. You will know that imagination is the
highest and most original activity in man, and that all
besides is only reflection upon it.’ Your imagination
creates the world, and you could have no God without the
world. “The knowledge of the source of this necessity
will not make anyone less certain, nor enable him to
escape the almost absolute necessity to have this idea of
God. Only as operative can God be in religion, and no one
has denied the divine life and action of the Universe.
With the God of existence and command religion has
nothing to do.” |

In the Third Speech, p. 120, “ Everyone misses in him-
self, etc.,” was, till the third edition, “ Seeing I myself miss
not a little in myself.”

On p. 138 another interesting personal reference has been
toned down. “ Were it not impious to wish to be more
than one is, I would wish that I could see as clearly how
the sense for art by itself passes into religion, how despite
the rest into which through each separate enjoyment the
spirit sinks, it yet feels itself urged to that progress which
might lead to the Universe. Why are those who have
gone this way, such silent natures? I do not know this
sense, it is my most marked limitation, it is the defect in
my nature that I feel most deeply. But I treat it with
esteem. I do not presume to see, but I believe. The
possibility of the matter stands clear before my eyes, only

284 THE FIRST EDITION,

it must remain a secret for me.” Again, p. 139, By the sense
for art the “ divine Plato raised the holiest mysticism on the
summit of divineness and humanness. Let me do homage to
the goddess to me unknown, that she cherished him and his
religion so carefully and disinterestedly.” :

In the Fourth Speech there are no changes of any
consequence.

In the Fifth Speech, the first clause, ‘‘ Man in closest
fellowship with the Highest,” was, “ Man in the intuition of
the Universe.” That is the key-note of the changes.
Intuition of the Universe gives place to relation to God.
Thus p. 217, “ The whole of all religions is nothing but the
sum of all relations of man to God,” replaces a passage that
derives the need of an endless mass of religious forms
from the number, variety, and independence of intuitions
of the Infinite.

Later the additions are more striking than the changes.
On p. 224, when he asks whether it is necessary to belong
to an existing religion, he replies “ By no means,” without
any “ Provisionally ” or any modification as in the para-
graph at the top of p. 225. Further additions are, on
p. 246 foot, “ and that for man under the power of the finite,
and particular, and too ready to imagine the divine itself
in this form, salvation is only to be found in the redemp-
tion”; p. 248, after “Yet He never maintained He
was the only mediator,” “the only one in whom His idea
actualized itself. All who attach themselves to Him and form
His Church should also be mediators with Him and through
Him”; further on, on the same page, the reason given why
the person who sets out from the same point as Christ is a
Christian, “It will naturally follow that they will acknow-
ledge Him,” and p. 249 the last clause in the second para-
graph about the first-fruits of the Spirit having special
holiness and worth. Page 251, first paragraph. “I at
least can only believe,” was “I at least fear.”

LN DX.

Acts of Apostles, 181.

America, 196, 197, 201, 205.

Ancients, religion of, 49, 65, 69.

Antithesis, xxix., lii., 3, 51, 256,

A

Aristotle, xxiii.

Art, xxxiii., xlii., lvii., 29, 37,68, 129,
138-141, 142, 146, 180, 283, 284.

Asceticism, 62.

Baptism, 160, 200-201.

Berkeley, xxx.

Berlin, xvii., xxi., xxxvii., xlvii.,
151.

Birth and death, 131.

Braasch, ix., xl.

Brinkmann, xvi., xvii., xli.

Butler, xxii.

CATHOLICISM, liv., 51, 254, 267-274.

Celibacy, 105.

Charité, the, xxiv.

Chinese Emperor, 194.

Christ, historical, xx., xxxv., liii., 17,
143, 187, 245, 262-263; as media-
tor, xl., liv., 246, 248-249, 258, 263-
264, 284; School of, 248.

Christianity, description of, xlv.-
xlvi., lii.-liii., 241-253, 262 ; priest-
hood of, 185; spread of, 108, 187,
188, 272 ; polemical, 243; catholic
in, 261; future of, xl., 265, 267-
268, 270.

Church, Apostolic, 192; Catholie,
23, 110, 182, 194, 195, 198, 205,
206, 260, 268; Evangelical or Pro-
testant, 110, 194, 261, 273, 274;
Greek, 23, 191, 194, 260, 272;
order in, 184; Reformed, xiii.,
xlix., 1, 189; and State, xlix.,
lviii., 164-176, 198-205; unity of,
xxxiii.; Visible and Invisible,
157-180, 190-193.

Communions, smaller, 196-197, 235,
261.

Conversation, religion in, 150-151,
183.

Conversion, 260.

Clergy, 153, 194, 206.

Creeds, 193-194, 206-207.

Culture, 92.

DEIsM, xxi., 14.

Dilthey, ix., xxvii., xxxvi.
Divorce, xxxviii.

Dogma, xlii., 87, 195, 238.
Dogmatics, liv., 109, 258.
Drossen, xvii., xx.

Epitions of “Speeches,” ix., xxxv.,
xxxix.-xlvi., li., 275-284.

Education and the church, 199-200,
203-204 ; of to-day, 136.

Ego, xxvii., 77, 78, 79, 84, 137, 138,
142, 145.

Emotions, 18.

England, religious life in, 9, 23, 197,
271, 275; Episcopal Church of,
197.

Eudaimonists, 116, 117.

Explanations, li.

FaitH implicit, 23.

Fichte, xxvii., xxviii., xxxvii., xlvii.,
113.

French, the, 10, 23.

French Revolution, xix., 10, 255.

GERMANY, religious life in, 9, 197,
207, 208, 270, 271, 274.

Glaubenslehre, xliii., li., 105-9, 101-
2, 114-5, 117, 145, 186-8, 192,

God, existence of, xxvii., 22, 93-99,
101, 115, 137; Kingdom of, 17,
145; personality of, xl., xliii., 95-
99, 116, 222, 256.

286

Goethe, x., xv., xxiv., XXV.

Grace, 90, 114; moments of, 228,
259.

Greeks, 96, 139.

HALLE, xv.-xvii., xxxix., xlvi., xlvii.:

Harms, xii., 1.

Heathenism, 108, 267.

Hegel, x., xi., lii., liv.

Herder, xxv.

Heresy, liv., 109-110, 223, 257.

Hierarchiats, Iviii.

History, xliv., xlvii.

Humanity, 71-78.

Humility, 79, 112.

Hypocrisy, 19.

' IpEatism, 40.

Illumination, The, x., xvi.,
xxil., xxxiv., xlii,

Imagination, xxvi., 98, 283.

Imaginative natures, 133-134.

Immortality, 92, 93, 99-101, 117, 118.

Individuality, xxx.

Infinite, seers of, 55.

Inspiration, 89.

Intuition, xliii., 44, 280, 284.

zix.) xxi...

JACOBI, xxill., xxx.
John, 262.
Judaism, xxxv., liii., 108, 238-241,

260, 261.

Kant and the Illumination, xxi.,
xxli.; influence of, x., xxii.; study
of, xv., xvi., xxiii, ; system of, xx.,
XXVli.-xxviii., 113.

Kantians, 116.

Klopstock, 106, 184.

Koran, 181.

Kurze Darstellung, lii., 107.

LANDSBERG, xx.

Leibnitz, xxviii.

Leo X., 269.

Lessing, xxiv.

Letter, the, 130, 144, 207.

Lipsius, ix., xi., xxxix.-xl., xliii.

Literature of edification, 182-183 ;
mediocre religious, 208.

Liturgy, xlix.-li.

Lord’s Supper, 193. °

Loyola, 269.

Lucinde, Confidential Letters on,
xxxvi.

Luther, 269.

INDEX,

MAHOMMEDANISM, liii. ~

oe 169, 170, 200-202; mixed,

Mediators, 6, 79, 113.

Messiah, 240.

Methodism, xiv., lvii.

Mind, predominating power in,
xxxiil. +27.

Miracle, 88, 89, 113, 114.

Missions, 23, 257.

Monotheism, liii., 111, 186.

Morals, aim of, xxxi., 261.

Moravians, xiii.-xv., xx., xxvi., xxxir.,
xxxv., lvii., 151, 183, 189, 197,

Music, 31, 59, 119, 152, 190.

Musical temperament, Iviii.

Mystics, 17, 154.

Mysticism, 133, 139.

Mythology, Heathen, 238, 256, 267;
senseless, 139, 163; use of, 108.
107, 126.

NAPOLEON, xi., xx., xlvi., xlvii., xlviii.,
xlix., 270, 273.

Nature, 65- 67, 282.

laws of, 67-71.

Neander, xi., lvi.

Novalis, xxv., xxvi., 41, 104, 184.

Oatus, 200,
Oratory, Sacred, 172, 203.

ae xl., 24, 97, 115, 116, 222,

25

Papacy, xxxvi., 269, 273.

Patriotism, xi., ‘xlv., xlvi., 255.

Paul, 112, 115, 186.

Personality, 77.

Peter, 143, 185.

Pietism, lvii., 144-145.

Piety. See “ Religion.”

Pious, Society of, 155.

Plato, xxiii., xxviii., xxxii., 118, 139,
284.

Polytheism, xlvi., 102, 110, 111, 139,
256, 257.

Poor, care of, 198,

Presentiment, 83, 225.

Priesthood of Humanity, 8; of Be-
lievers, 151, 153, 185.

Priests, 2, 141, 153.

Prophecy, 89, 256.

Proselytes, Jewish, 143,.

Proselytizing, 187-188.

een liv., 51, 195, 254, 267-

INDEX,

Pünjer, ix., xxxix.
Purism, xliv.

RATIONALISM, xxi., 257.

Reason, xxviii.

Reformation, I., liv., 268, 272.

Religion as activity, 27-29; aim of,
xxxi.; artistic conception of,
xxxlii.; communication of, 149-
152, 158, 190; corruption of, 215-
216; definition of, lii., 103; en-
dowments of, 198; and ethics,
xxxiii., xliii., 14, 36-42, 141, 261,
262; in the family, 178, 189; as
feeling, xxxiii., xxxvi., xlii., 45-
50; heroes of, 60, 135, 230, 237,
275; and history, 80-82; impelling
to action, 56-59; individuality in,
225, 232, 259; imitation of, 122;
its infinity, 54, 82; as knowledge,
xxziii., xliii., 29-3], 35, 36, 38-40 ;
a malady, 147; mastership in,
lvii., 123, 172-175; and metaphy-
sics, xxii., xxxii., 14, 34, 102, 141,
276; and morality, xxii., 18, 34,
56-62, 84; representatives of, 135 ;
its rise, 12; and sensuous self-
consciousness, 106; social, 148;

‘and the state, xxxiv., 19-21, 24,
37; asa system, 50-56; not teach-
able, 122; teleological, liii., 145;
true and false in, 108, 187; types
of, 221.

Religions. Natural, 214, 217, 230,
232, 233, 234, 265; nature of,
xxxiv.-xxxv., lvii., 218, 223;
plurality of, 212-214, 254; posi-
tive, 214-218, 234.

Religious life, rise of, 225-228, 258-
260.

Revelation, 89-90.

Ritschl, ix., xl., lvii.

Romantic School, xxiii., xxiv., xxvi.,
xli., lvii., 275.

Rome, 55, 109-110.

Rule of religious, lviii., 163.

Sack, xx., xxxv., xliii.

Schelling, xxvi., xxix.

Schiller, xxxvi.

Schlegel Friedrich, xii., xxv., xxvi.,
XXXVi., XXXVii., xxxix., xlv., xlviii.

Schleiermacher, birth, xiv.; death,

287

ly.-lvi.; doubts, xv.,23 ; estimates
of, x.-xii., lvi.-lviii.; marriage,
xlviii.; parentage, xiii.-xiv.; per-
sonal references, xlii., 8, 9, 283,
284 ; uncle, xvii.; works of, xii.,
xix., XXXVil., Xxxvili,, xxxix., xlvi.,
xlvii., li., lii.; works on, ix.

Schlobitten, xviii.

Science, aim of, xxxi., 94, 141.

Scriptures, canon of, 249, 264;
exposition of, xvi., xxi., xlvii., 182;
a logical mediator, 237 ; monument
of heroic time, 91; and piety, 150,
181; not unmixed, 33-34, 237, 277.

Sectarianism, 22, 153, 162, 220, 255.

Sense, 127, 186, 154, 159, 164; per-
ception, 42-45.

Socrates, 38, 184.

Spinoza, x., xxiii., xxviii., xliii., 40-
41, 104-105.

Spinozism, xxviii., xl., 97, 115.

Steffens, xxvi., xlvi.

Stein, xlviii.

Stourdza, 23.

Strauss, xxxiv., li., lviii.

Supernatural, liii., 125, 257.

Synodal government, xlix., 206.

System, 55, 109, 161, 195, 258.

TASKMASTER, 178-179.
Theology, lii., liv., lviii.; systems of,
15-18, 40.

UNCULTURED, the, 11.
Understanding, people of, 125, 128.
132.

Uniformity, xlix., 74, 231, 278.
Unitarianism, 197.

Universal Lawgiver, 35.
Universe, active, xxix.
Upheaval, times of, 120-121.
Utilitarianism, xxi., 131.

VERSATILITY, 136.
Virtuosos, 86.

WILHELM MEISTER, x., xxv.

Women, piety of, 37, 47.

World-Spirit, xxviii, 49, 70, 71, 81,
84, 111, 135, 211; Soul, 111.

Zeus, 64, 265.
Zinzendorf, 269.

BINDING SECT. MAY.2 1 1981

PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE
CARDS OR SLIPS FROM THIS POCKET

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO LIBRARY

Schleiermacher, Friedrich
Ernst Daniel

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