tside; it must express his life and its needs.

It cannot be denied that supernatural sanctions have often been very
effective for certain types of people in certain anarchic periods. The
robber baron of the Middle Ages, credulous and superstitious, was
restrained at times by his fear of the penalties threatened by Mother
Church. But so is a burglar by a pistol pointed at him, even if it is
not loaded. In the past, a code of morality much in advance of the
times has, no doubt, often been aided by religious sanctions. But
{174} it is foolish to base one's theories upon exceptional conditions.
We must remember that the situation confronted by the Christian
tradition after the breakdown of the political and social life of the
Roman Empire was abnormal. A turbulent mass of barbarians faced the
ethics and theology of an overthrown civilization. It cannot too often
be pointed out that this situation was unhealthy in many ways. It is
not good for a people to have codes of morality thrust upon it from
outside. Especially is it bad when the code is in many ways untrue to
human nature under normal conditions. Ascetic, other-worldly
Christianity distorted the impulses of mediaeval man. And it is certain
that religious sanctions, alone, enabled it to control society.

We have seen that religion and morality marched together as long as the
evolution of the society was healthy and natural. Often there was a
struggle over the ritual and mythical elements in religious morality;
but, as a rule, the civic type of morality gained the upper hand.
Religious sanctions were called in because of the faith in divine
powers interested in the welfare of the community, but these sanctions
soon ceased to be creative. While the gods remained, these sanctions
would necessarily remain; yet they tended to become benevolent and
secondary.

But Christianity, by reason of the forces at work at the time of its
origin, nourished vicious interpretations of morality. The despair of
human nature which we note in the writings of St. Paul tinged the
outlook of Christian ethics. Man is by nature evil; only the working
in his soul of a supernatural grace can lead him to value the things
which are pure and of good {175} repute. This pessimism cannot be too
sharply spurned. Man is neither angel nor devil; he is just man. And
the modern thinker is pretty well convinced that morality is a purely
human affair growing out of the instinctive tendencies