304 ADAPTATION AND PROGRESS 



accept the interpretation of religion as given by Jesus, 1 but again 

 turns aside from all super-naturalism although apparently he 

 rejects the religion of naturalism. 2 



On the whole Ross seems to consider religion to be an idealiza- 

 tion of social relations and experiences, and one of the most potent 

 factors in securing both order and progress. " A body of religious 

 belief of the kind I have described [the faith that makes for ethical 

 religion] ", he says, " is a storage battery of moral emotion. It 

 is a means of storing up for society the moral energy of the ethical 

 elite, and enabling it to do work by producing sociable emotions 

 and modifying conduct in desirable ways." 3 



Comparing the value of social religion with other means of 

 social control he says: " The palm must always belong to that 

 influence which goes to the root of man's badness, and by giving 

 him more interests and sympathies converts a narrow self into a 

 broad self." 4 He concludes that " social religion has a long and 

 possibly a great career awaiting it." " As it disengages itself 

 from that which is transient and perishable," he continues, " as 

 the dross is purged away from its beliefs and the element of social 

 compulsion entirely disappears from it, social religion will be- 

 come purer and nobler. No longer a paid ally of the policeman, 

 no longer a pillar of social order, it will take its unquestioned place 

 with art, and science, and wisdom, as one of the free manifesta- 

 tions of the higher human spirit." 



IDEALIZATION AND RELIGION ACCORDING TO BALDWIN 



Professor Baldwin's Social and Ethical Interpretations 5 so 

 abounds in material bearing on this phase of our subject that 

 selection or a brief summary is difficult. 



The imagination, according to our author, is not merely con- 

 structive in its activity but " creative " for the products of its 

 activity are " new forms into which the materials of our thought 

 are cast as a result of variations in our actions in the process of 



1 Social Control, pp. 204 f. 



2 Ibid., p. 213. The Religion of Naturalism is not given the best possible 

 interpretation. 



3 Ibid., p. 212. * Ibid., p. 216. 8 Also his Individual and, Society. 



