Religion and Psychology 311 



bad conscience. These were projected outwards and formed the 

 basis of the systematic doctrines of the Fatherhood of God, the 

 Atonement, etc.^ 



We can meet these arguments in two ways : one theoretical 

 and the other practical. Theoretically, we can say that they are 

 guilty of what Aristotle called a [xETa^aai? zic, oKKo ysvoQ, — 

 the fallacy of explaining the facts of one science in terms of the 

 concepts of another — of explaining the normal mind in terms of 

 the abnormal, without first giving an adequate theory of the dis- 

 tinction between normal and abnormal. An analogous situation 

 exists in the neighbouring science of physiology. No one would 

 explain physiological change in terms of pathology. Physiology 

 benefits by knowledge gained from pathology. Pathology also 

 clearly gains enormously from the knowledge of physiology. But 

 the two sciences are quite distinct. Clearly pathology is in the 

 main subsidiary to physiology. The second line of attack is the 

 more satisfactory one of actual experience. According to one's 

 experiences of the pathological processes of projection and regres- 

 sion and the influence of the Oedipus complex in a patient, these 

 are usually diminished or eliminated by a course of psycho-analysis. 

 If, therefore, the typical religious attitude towards life is explicable 

 in these terms, the religious consciousness would be altered by 

 analysis in the direction of elimination. One would expect, 

 according to this theory, that deep analysis would leave the patient 

 less religious than he was before. My own experience has been 

 the exact opposite of this. After an analysis (for scientific purposes) 

 by a leading psycho-analyst extending over ninety-two hours, my 

 religious convictions were stronger than before, not weaker. The 

 analysis had indeed a purifying effect upon my religious feelings, 

 freeing them from much that was merely infantile and supported 

 by sentimental associations or historical accidents. But the ulti- 

 mate result has been that I have become more convinced than ever 

 that religion is the most important thing in life and that it is essential 

 to mental health. The need of forms and ceremonies is another 

 matter, far less fundamental. In many patients whom I have 

 myself analysed I have found a similar result. Although mere 



^ Although psychological factor's of this kind, among others, may contri- 

 bute their share to crude religious emotion, to use them to explain away the 

 essential characteristics of religious experience would be to " pour away the baby 

 with the bath-water." 



