l in its endeavour after goodness,
it would have done us an immense service. But one may well wonder
whether if religion did no more than this it would have maintained
itself as it has and renew through the changing generations its
compelling appeal. More strong than any purely intellectual curiosity
as to a first cause or controlling power, more haunting than any wonder
as to the source and destiny of life, more persistent than any
loneliness of the questing soul is our dissatisfaction with ourselves,
our consciousness of tragic moral fault, our need of forgiveness and
deliverance. This longing for deliverance has taken many forms.

Henry Osborn Taylor in a fine passage has shown us how manifold are the
roads men have travelled in their quest for salvation.[2] "For one man
shall find his peace in action, another in the rejection of action, even
in the seeming destruction of desire; another shall have peace and
freedom through intellectual inquiry, while another must obey his God or
love his God and may stand in very conscious need of divine salvation.
The adjustment sought by Confucius was very different from that which
drew the mind of Plato or led Augustine to the City of God. Often quite
different motives may inspire the reasonings which incidentally bring
men to like conclusions.... The life adjustment of the early Greek
philosophers had to do with scientific curiosity.... They were not like
Gotama seeking relief from the tedious impermanence of personal
experience any more than they were seeking to insure their own eternal
welfare in and through the love of God, the motive around which surged
the Christian yearning for salvation. Evidently every religion is a
means of adjustment or deliverance."

[Footnote 2: "Deliverance," pp. 4 and 5.]

Professor James in his chapter on The Sick Souls deals most suggestively
with these driving longings and all the later analyses of the psychology
of conversion begin with the stress of the divided self. The deeper
teaching of the New Testament roots itself in this soil. The literature
of confession is rich in classic illustrations of all this, told as only
St. Augustine more than a thousand years ago or Tolstoy yesterday can
tell it. No need to quote them here; they are easily accessible for
those who would find for their own longings immortal voices and be
taught with what searching self-analysis those who have come out of
darkness into light have dealt with their own sick sou