varying proportions. Religion we have seen was
in the last century regarded mainly in its theoretical aspect as a
doctrine. Greek religion for example meant to most educated persons
Greek mythology. Yet even a cursory examination shows that neither
Greek nor Roman had any creed or dogma, any hard and fast formulation
of belief. In the Greek Mysteries (See my "Prolegomena to the Study of
Greek Religion", page 155, Cambridge, 1903.) only we find what we should
call a Confiteor; and this is not a confession of faith, but an avowal
of rites performed. When the religion of primitive peoples came to be
examined it was speedily seen that though vague beliefs necessarily
abound, definite creeds are practically non-existent. Ritual is dominant
and imperative.

This predominance and priority of ritual over definite creed was first
forced upon our notice by the study of savages, but it promptly and
happily joined hands with modern psychology. Popular belief says, I
think, therefore I act; modern scientific psychology says, I act (or
rather, REact to outside stimulus), and so I come to think. Thus there
is set going a recurrent series: act and thought become in their turn
stimuli to fresh acts and thoughts. In examining religion as envisaged
to-day it would therefore be more correct to begin with the practice
of religion, i.e. ritual, and then pass to its theory, theology or
mythology. But it will be more convenient to adopt the reverse
method. The theoretical content of religion is to those of us who are
Protestants far more familiar and we shall thus proceed from the known
to the comparatively unknown.

I shall avoid all attempt at rigid definition. The problem before the
modern investigator is, not to determine the essence and definition of
religion but to inquire how religious phenomena, religious ideas and
practices arose. Now the theoretical content of religion, the domain of
theology or mythology, is broadly familiar to all. It is the world of
the unseen, the supersensuous; it is the world of what we call the soul
and the supposed objects of the soul's perception, sprites, demons,
ghosts and gods. How did this world grow up?

We turn to our savages. Intelligent missionaries of bygone days used to
ply savages with questions such as these: Had they any belief in God?
Did they believe in the immortality of the soul? Taking their own
clear-cut conceptions, discriminated by a developed terminology, these
missionaries tried to