Its principles may be eternal, but the expression of those principles requires continual development. The fact of the religious vision, and its history of persistent expansion, is our one ground for optimism. Apart from it, human life is a flash of occasional enjoyments lighting up a mass of pain and misery, a bagatelle of transient experience. Apart from religion, expressed in ways generally intelligible, populations sink into the apathetic task of daily survival, with minor alleviations. Generality is the salt of religion.
Religion is the last refuge of human savagery.
The uncritical association of religion with goodness is directly negativated by plain facts. Religion can he and has been, the main instrument for progress. But if we survey the whole race, we' must pronounce that generally it has not been so. Such religion is a branch of diplomacy. A religion, on its doctrinal side, can thus be defined as a system of general truths which have the effect of transforming character when they are sincerely held and vividly apprehended.