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genuine pity for his fellow-men . It was reserved for Christ alone to love and weep , to pity and comfort , to shield from contempt and to raise up humanity from the scathing scorn of its self-contempt . The union of love and religion forms the prevailing feature of the latter
ages of antiquity . U Ordre pour base . Order , the primary support of the universal frame of nature , the soul and synonym of law , had to be affirmed by the middle age . Political stability , social happiness , domestic
relations , had to be enlarged and rearrangedupon the broader basis afforded by the adoption of a new element in religion , and to the endless changes and reaccommodations of the middle ages we owe all that is excellent as well as that which is mistaken in our political and
social codes . Le Progres pour but . This is the last and noblest stage of human history , as far as we can yet discern it . A firm basis , a standingplace being obtained , the mighty lever of progress moves the world . Regarding antiquity as the birth-period of religion , it is interesting to observe in what manner , and according to w hat progressive law , the human mind has emerged from the confusion consequent upon the
conception of a closer connection between man and nature . That the connection did exist , there was never any doubt in the minds of those who first began to make use of the reasoning faculty , but a spirituality , akin to that mysticism , of which we have the best example in Jacob Behme , led the mind astray . Fetish worship has been well characterised by Mr . Lewes , as a " tendency to conceive all exterior bodies as animated with a life essentially
analogous to our own . " * This tendency led to the reverence , and subsequently the worship , of the Divine Being , through the outward symbols of his creation . Stones , trees , plants , each imbued with a peculiar life , were , to the worshipper in those days , what saints are in the Papal system . Eeverence for the uses or the forms of these various objects became intensified into worship ; but time went
on , and the tree was blasted by the lightning , the plant was uprooted by the storm , the stone cleft in twain by volcanic agency , and the worshippers , finding that their gods were unable to defend themselves , extended the principle to animals , but the animals perished , and again the mistake was evident . Thus step by step was fetishism converted into polytheism ; the unseen and therefore necessarily unrecognised powers of electricity and chemistry were canonized and adored . Men
prayed to be spared from their destroying agency , and the antagonistic theory of Good and Evil was pursued . Eorms of unknown repulsiveness or inconceivable grandeur were attributed to these principles , but the imagination exhausting itself , reaction again ensued , and the gods were clothed in the noble and glorious shape of man himself . Thus refining and spiritualizing , the creeds wavered on fitfully and uncertainly , till the mind was taught to recognize One alone as the Being which guided the universal system . The philosophy of the times * Lewes ' fl Philosophy of the Sciences , section vi . p . 273 .
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
Untitled Article
genuine pity for his fellow-men . It was reserved for Christ alone to love and weep , to pity and comfort , to shield from contempt and to raise up humanity from the scathing scorn of its self-contempt . The union of love and religion forms the prevailing feature of the latter
ages of antiquity . U Ordre pour base . Order , the primary support of the universal frame of nature , the soul and synonym of law , had to be affirmed by the middle age . Political stability , social happiness , domestic
relations , had to be enlarged and rearrangedupon the broader basis afforded by the adoption of a new element in religion , and to the endless changes and reaccommodations of the middle ages we owe all that is excellent as well as that which is mistaken in our political and
social codes . Le Progres pour but . This is the last and noblest stage of human history , as far as we can yet discern it . A firm basis , a standingplace being obtained , the mighty lever of progress moves the world . Regarding antiquity as the birth-period of religion , it is interesting to observe in what manner , and according to w hat progressive law , the human mind has emerged from the confusion consequent upon the
conception of a closer connection between man and nature . That the connection did exist , there was never any doubt in the minds of those who first began to make use of the reasoning faculty , but a spirituality , akin to that mysticism , of which we have the best example in Jacob Behme , led the mind astray . Fetish worship has been well characterised by Mr . Lewes , as a " tendency to conceive all exterior bodies as animated with a life essentially
analogous to our own . " * This tendency led to the reverence , and subsequently the worship , of the Divine Being , through the outward symbols of his creation . Stones , trees , plants , each imbued with a peculiar life , were , to the worshipper in those days , what saints are in the Papal system . Eeverence for the uses or the forms of these various objects became intensified into worship ; but time went
on , and the tree was blasted by the lightning , the plant was uprooted by the storm , the stone cleft in twain by volcanic agency , and the worshippers , finding that their gods were unable to defend themselves , extended the principle to animals , but the animals perished , and again the mistake was evident . Thus step by step was fetishism converted into polytheism ; the unseen and therefore necessarily unrecognised powers of electricity and chemistry were canonized and adored . Men
prayed to be spared from their destroying agency , and the antagonistic theory of Good and Evil was pursued . Eorms of unknown repulsiveness or inconceivable grandeur were attributed to these principles , but the imagination exhausting itself , reaction again ensued , and the gods were clothed in the noble and glorious shape of man himself . Thus refining and spiritualizing , the creeds wavered on fitfully and uncertainly , till the mind was taught to recognize One alone as the Being which guided the universal system . The philosophy of the times * Lewes ' fl Philosophy of the Sciences , section vi . p . 273 .