I . Introduction 



In this chapter we are concerned with the history of the relation- 

 ship, one to another, of two great departments of human activity. 

 Our treatment will therefore need to be very different from what 

 it would be if we were discussing either department separately. 

 Looking back through history we can see that always and every- 

 where, since man attained the level of civilisation, there has been 

 activity in both departments. Yet only under certain circum- 

 stances do the two sides of man's nature represented by these 

 departments come to affect each other. It is often t"he case there- 

 fore that periods and movements that are of great importance for 

 the history of religion as such, or for the history of science as such, 

 may have very Httle significance for the end we have here in view ; 

 while periods on which historians of science and historians of re- 

 ligion lay but scant stress may be of great importance for our purpose. 



Apart from the necessarily imperfect character of a short 

 sketch covering so vast a period of time, there is a certain respect 

 in which such an account must perforce remain extremely unsatis- 

 factory. It is impossible in such an historical account to treat 

 any aspect of religion save its formal and external exhibition. Thus 

 we shall be dealing with precisely that aspect which many will 

 think the least important in the religious life. Yet it is only when 

 religion expresses itself in formal and external fashion that it can 

 be said to come into contact with the scientific standpoint. The 

 reader must realise this limitation at the very outset and I would 

 beg him to bear it in his mind throughout, as I have borne it in 

 mine. Unless we accept such a limitation, the attempt on which 

 we are embarked would involve no less than a history of the human 

 heart. I do not believe it would be possible to write such a history, 

 for the topic is unsuited to the historical method. Nor, if such a 

 history could be written, would it have any clear relation to the 

 development of scientific thought. 



But I must draw my reader's attention to a further limitation 

 which is not inherent in the method but is self-imposed. I am to 

 discuss the historical development of the relations of religion and 



