The Universality of Christ (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos or missing text. Not indexed. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1922. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... Lecture II IS A UNIVERSAL RELIGION POSSIBLE? Yesteedat we were considering two closely related methods of study applied to human religion: the historical, which is a comparison of what men have believed and experienced at different dates; and the comparative, which is a comparison as a rule of what men believe and experience at the present day in different places. Both of them, as we saw, had this mark; they are concerned with religion on its psychological side. They are concerned with religion as an activity of the human soul. And when we are taking steps to strengthen our devotional life or to commend our faith to those who do not at present accept it, we are bound to take notice of these psychological conditions. In strengthening the devotional life we have to understand what our own condition is in order that we may wisely handle it. We have to understand the kind of stimuli to which we re-act and so forth. In exactly the same way, if we want to commend our faith to other people, we must know the working of their minds sufficiently to realise which are the points that they can most easily apprehend first, so that having, as it were, got their footing in the world of faith, they may gradually make their own way in it, and become free of it as a whole. There is therefore this absolutely necessary place for the psychological study of religion. But there is another danger about it, besides those which I mentioned yesterday, and which is more especially relevant to the theme that is to occupy us to-day. It is a danger, most clearly illustrated, I think, by Professor William James's well-known book, Varieties of Religious Experience. James virtually limits the term "religious experience" to particular psychological occurrences, and moreover, to abnormal psyc...