CHAPTER IX. 



PRIMITIVE IDEAS OP RELIGION : THE IDEA OF GOD. 



MAX MULLER, in his lectures on the Science of Reli- 

 gion, rejects the ordinary division into natural and 

 revealed religions, and adopts a threefold grouping, 

 corresponding to the division of languages into Tura- 

 nian, Aryan, and Semitic. Though not quite satisfac- 

 tory, more especially in its treatment of revelation, 

 this method is suggestive of some important thoughts 

 and questions. While we regard, for example, our 

 own religion as revealed, we must bear in mind that it 

 necessarily includes also the elements of natural reli- 

 gion. Further, while it may be classed as Semitic, as 

 coming to us through a Semitic people, yet, according 

 to its own history, in its earlier stages it was much 

 more general than this, and in its earliest stage uni- 

 versal. Still further, we must not forget that it was 

 not all revealed at once that Adam, for example, 

 could have known very little of it, Noah a little more, 

 Abraham a little more, and so on. Again, the natural 

 religion to which St. Paul refers in the first chapter of 

 the Epistle to the Romans, as sufficient to teach men 

 the power and divinity of God, was never absolutely 

 pure at any time subsequent to the fall of man, and 

 must have always contained some mixture, and this 



