EVOLUTION AND THE IIIGIIKIl IIUM.VN LIFE 289 



adopted above are to be found amonj^ all men, and they 

 must be examined so that their agreements and dilTer- 

 ences may be demonstrated, and their common elements 

 may be explained as the natural products of a i)roces.s of 

 evolution. 



Such a broad comparative study, like that of physical, 

 mental, and social phenomena discussed heretofore, 

 must be conducted objectively ; that is, each and every 

 particular belief of a religious or theological nature 

 which can be discovered in any race is entitled to a i)Iace 

 in the array of materials which demand scientific treat- 

 ment. They must be verified, classified, and summa- 

 rized, in order that their total meaning and value can 

 be discovered. It must be strongly empha^sized that for 

 such purposes the inherent validity and truth or falsity 

 of diverse religions are not called into (juestion when 

 they are so considered as objects of study; many still 

 entertain the view that the mere task of conducting an 

 analysis of a group of religious beliefs of whatever nature 

 must tend to destroy or alter that system of religion in 

 some way and degree. But whatever the comparative 

 student may himself believe, the conception of Jehovah 

 in the Hebrew religion is quite as legitimate an object of 

 study as the Buddhistic concept of Brahma as the Ulti- 

 mate Being, or the Polynesian idea (^f Tangaroa as the 

 god of the waves. We would naturally be inclined to 

 exclude the last from our own personal system of piety 

 and worship as the childish concept of an imaginative, 

 adolescent race; but whatever the truth may be, the 

 fact of a belief in Tangaroa is as real as tlie fact of Chris- 

 tian belief in God. We can no more destroy anyone 

 of these ideas by investigating its nature and origin than 



