Religious rite

“ Very likely, because they are more familiar with the phraseology of the Scriptures than you are; and they feel the power of religious truth on their heart more forcibly than you profess to do. Your religion, if I judge from your conversation, is the religion of opinion, theirs of belief—yours of speculation, theirs of principle—yours of forms and ceremonies, theirs of knowledge and of feeling—yours [419] of times and seasons, theirs of habitual devotion; and while you derive no consolation from the routine of duties which you perform, they have peace with God through Jesus Christ. ”

“ It was the extremer cases that I had in mind a little while ago when I said that personal religion, even without theology or ritual, would prove to embody some elements that morality pure and simple does not contain. ”

“ But the best among them, as no one who has had opportunities of really knowing them will hesitate to affirm, are more genuinely religious, in the best sense of the word religion, than those who exclusively arrogate to themselves the title. ”

“ The present volume is a plea for a reconsideration of the Religious question, and an inquiry as to the possibility of reconstructing Religion by shifting its basis from inscrutable dogmas to the unquestionable facts of man's moral nature. ”

“ I came into intimate relations with a Christian faith-curist, and felt it to be my religious duty to be anointed by him for the removal of my perverted nature and for the reception of the normal instincts of a man. ”

“ Conclude, then, with me, that the Christian virtues are chimerical, always useless, and sometimes pernicious to men, and attended with advantage to none but priests. Conclude that this religion, with all the boasted beauty of its morality, recommends to us a set of virtues, and enjoins a line of conduct, at variance with good sense. ”

“ So here it must be that the extreme examples let us more deeply into the secrets of the religious life, explain why the tamer ones value their religion so much, tame though it be, because it is so continuous with a so much acuter ideal. ”

“ Therefore the religious sentiment, which through the agency of vital immanence emerges from the lurking places of the subconsciousness, is the germ of all religion, and the explanation of everything that has been or ever will be in any religion. ”

“ They were men of sterling character, of deep religious convictions, of willingness to make painful sacrifices for the sake of principle, of great reverence for the Bible and the institutions of religion, of purity of life in the home and in their social relations. They believed that religion was the supreme thing and that the commandments of God were of binding obligation upon all intelligent moral beings. ”

“ Hence it is indispensably necessary for the Christian, in every period of his life, but especially when entering on his religious course, to implore the gracious influence of the Divine Spirit, to guard him against every species of error—to lead him into all truth—and to invest the truth with that holy unction, which will render it no less a source of the highest intellectual improvement, than of the most exquisite mental enjoyment. ”

“ What is this but to say that Religion, in her fullest exercise of function, is not a mere illumination of facts already elsewhere given, not a mere passion, like love, which views things in a rosier light. ”

“ The religious establishments of Christianity, therefore, have done more not only to support the life of virtue, but to show all its springs and sources, than all the works of all the Philosophers who have ever expounded its principles or its practice. ”

“ But to be religious in the world—to be pious and holy and earnest-minded in the counting-room, the manufactory, the market-place, the field, the farm—to cany our good and solemn thoughts and feelings into the throng and thoroughfare of daily life,—this is the great difficulty of our Christian calling. ”

“ But in all that pertains to the emotional, the devotional, and especially to the moral side of religion, we are far behind them. The animating spirit of life, under the predominating influence of the religious sentiment, was, as we have seen, a conscientious endeavor to live, in all ways, a life of purity, of virtue, and of implicit obedience to the highest dictates of truth, according to the understanding of truth which then prevailed. ”

“ I go away from all three to an enlightened, thoughtful man, and ask—"What doctrines, good sir, are most important to religion?" And he answers, "No doubt suck as produce the manliest and most natural life: to me, the infinite perfection of God, man's fitness for his duty and his destination, immortality, the religious value of daily life. Get all the truth you can, young man; have faith in your mind, your heart, your conscience, your soul. Religion is natural, whole, human life—right feeling, right thinking, right doing, right being." ”

“ Behold, Madam, to what the dogmas of natural religion reduce us: in meditating on it, and in practising its duties, we shall be truly religious, and filled with the spirit of the Divinity; we shall be admired and respected by men; we shall be in the right way to be loved by those who rule over us, and respected by those who serve us; we shall be truly happy in this world, and we shall have nothing to fear in the next. ”

“ Admitting that faith were possible, what connection can exist between such occult speculations and the manifest duties of mankind, duties which are palpable to every one who, in the least, consults his reason, his interest, or the welfare of the society to which he belongs? Before I can be satisfied of the advantages of justice, temperance, and benevolence, must I first believe in the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Eucharist, and all the fables of the Old Testament? ”

“ As God's redemptive action advanced historically, unfolding religious truth and grace gradually and educationally, so the moral ideal, which Christianity in its fulness of provision and power should exhibit, is found more and more clearly revealed till the view is completed. ”

“ Religion, therefore, as I now ask you arbitrarily to take it, shall mean for us the feelings, acts, and experiences of individual men in their solitude, so far as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to whatever they may consider the divine. Since the relation may be either moral, physical, or ritual, it is evident that out of religion in the sense in which we take it, theologies, philosophies, and ecclesiastical organizations may secondarily grow. ”

“ But in addition to these ideas of the more concrete religious objects, religion is full of abstract objects which prove to have an equal power. God's attributes as such, his holiness, his justice, his mercy, his absoluteness, his infinity, his omniscience, his tri-unity, the various mysteries of the redemptive process, the operation of the sacraments, etc., have proved fertile wells of inspiring meditation for Christian believers. ”

“ The form of religion first proclaimed by the greatest religious genius that ever lit the world, and sealed by his martyrdom, is now officially represented by men of vulgar talents, of vulgar aspirations,—to be rich, respectable, and fat,—and of vulgar lives. ”

“ I am equally as religious in the kanyons hauling wood as in the pulpit; and if I were agoing to swear in either place, I should prefer the pulpit to swear in; consequently, I consider that a man should live his religion in all places, and under all circumstances and situations in life. ”

“ I have no fear of philosophy. I am willing to look a doubt fairly in the face, and think reason is sacred as conscience, affection, or the religious faculty in man. I see a profound piety in modern science. I have aimed to set forth absolute religion, the ideal religion of human nature, free piety, free goodness, free thought. ”

“ If we question, in the name of science or philosophy, the significance of this religious faith in the divine altruism, and endeavor to support our objections by an appeal to the results of dispassionate observation and reflection, we shall find only its confirmation. ”

“ Prayer in this wide sense is the very soul and essence of religion. "Religion," says a liberal French theologian, "is an intercourse, a conscious and voluntary relation, entered into by a soul in distress with the mysterious power upon which it feels itself to depend, and upon which its fate is contingent. ”

“ That the essence of religion consisted in the feelings of divine love; and that it was a matter of indifference what opinions Christians entertained concerning points of faith, provided their hearts burned with the sacred flame of piety and love. (2.) That the union of the soul with Christ transforms it into the essence of the Deity. ”

“ Is not this teaching the very reverse of that of all other peoples and religions? Can you imagine the religious teachers of any other religion being warned to keep themselves free from visions? Are not visions and trances, dreams and imaginations, the very proof of holiness? ”

“ It is true that their ideas of religious truth were crude and not of a very high order, but the element of worship of and responsibility to a superior being existed and found expression in various ways. ”

“ And so it has varied from age to age, and can and must change in our time also, assimilating its culture, if Christianity still wishes to answer to the spiritual demands of our time. The religious and moral value of fundamental truths remains ”

“ Adopt only those of my sentiments which you believe are true, and reject all the others; and whatever religion you may ultimately embrace, remember that its real duties are independent of human institutions—that no religion upon earth can dispense with the sacred obligations of morality—that an upright heart is the temple of the Divinity—and that, in every country and in every sect, to love God above all things, and thy neighbor as thyself, is the substance and summary of the law—the end and aim of religious duty. ”

“ Religion becomes the worship of the God who is the source and standard of goodness, the love of the Eternal who loveth righteousness, the child's crying out into the dark—O righteous Father.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of Wisdom. ”

“ "He believes in No-God, and he worships him," said a colleague of mine of a student who was manifesting a fine atheistic ardor; and the more fervent opponents of Christian doctrine have often enough shown a temper which, psychologically considered, is indistinguishable from religious zeal. ”

“ If religion is to mean anything definite for us, it seems to me that we ought to take it as meaning this added dimension of emotion, this enthusiastic temper of espousal, in regions where morality strictly so called can at best but bow its head and acquiesce. It ought to mean nothing short of this new reach of freedom for us, with the struggle over, the keynote of the universe sounding in our ears, and everlasting possession spread before our eyes. ”

“ And we should not hesitate to class in the list of primitive and outgrown religious ideas the worship of saints, and the common belief that a person acquires peculiar supernatural authority in religious matters by the laying on of hands, or by any other form of ordination. ”

“ As to myself, my religious reading has long been confined to the moral branch of religion, which is the same in all religions; while in that branch which consists of dogmas, all differ, all have a different set. ”

“ Now we venture to believe that we have peculiar and pre-eminent advantages for answering questions of this nature—that we are prepared to point out the way to the acquisition of a religious character, and consequently the way to eternal life with more clearness and certainty than is attainable under any other system of theological belief. ”

“ This is sometimes expressed by saying that they are redemptive religions--religions interested in freeing mankind from some vast and universal burden, of imperfection, of unreasonableness, of evil, of misery, of fate, of unworthiness, or of sin. Now, for my present purposes, this interest in the salvation of man shall be made, in these lectures, the essential feature of religion in so far as religion shall here be dealt with. ”

“ Yet the multitude of Christians ranged downward from such great obsession, through all stages of human half-heartedness and frailty, to the state of those whose Christianity was but a name, or but a magic rite. ”

“ There must be something solemn, serious, and tender about any attitude which we denominate religious. If glad, it must not grin or snicker; if sad, it must not scream or curse. It is precisely as being solemn experiences that I wish to interest you in religious experiences. ”

“ For the want of making these reflections, simple as they are, all the religions in the world are filled with an infinite number of frivolous practices, by which men have long strove to render themselves acceptable to the Deity. ”

“ And the true meaning of religion is thus, not simply morality, but morality touched by emotion. ”

“ Ought it to be assumed that in all men the mixture of religion with other elements should be identical? Ought it, indeed, to be assumed that the lives of all men should show identical religious elements? ”

“ Religion descends from heaven to break our chains. She alone raises me from degradation, and bids me lift my drooping head, and look up to heaven. Yes; it is that very gospel which by some is supposed to present such dark, degrading, gloomy views of man and his destiny, which lifts me from the dust to set me among princes—on a level with angels—in a sense above them. To say nothing of the divine nobility grace imparts to a soul which is stamped anew with the likeness and image of God, how sacred and venerable does even this body appear in the eye of piety! ”

“ In these times, the true idea of religion comes back to men, the infinitely perfect God, man so noble in nature, conscience so true, will so strong, human destination so fair and wonderful—and deep religious emotions spring up again, reverence for God and his unchanging law of right. Then we say to the tempter, "Get thee behind me!—who am I to debase my nature and sully my soul? "Many a noble youth has thus tottered on the sharp and perilous edge of ruin till true religion flashed her early light upon his road, and he turned and crept back safely. ”