_, xv., 44). And there have been many others who have
shared his opinion. But where does religion end and superstition begin,
or perhaps rather we should say at what point does superstition merge
into religion? What is the criterion by means of which we discriminate
between them?
It would be of little profit to recapitulate here, even summarily, the
principal definitions, each bearing the impress of the personal feeling
of its definer, which have been given of religion. Religion is better
described than defined and better felt than described. But if there is
any one definition that latterly has obtained acceptance, it is that of
Schleiermacher, to the effect that religion consists in the simple
feeling of a relationship of dependence upon something above us and a
desire to establish relations with this mysterious power. Nor is there
much amiss with the statement of W. Hermann[48] that the religious
longing of man is a desire for truth concerning his human existence. And
to cut short these extraneous citations, I will end with one from the
judicious and perspicacious Cournot: "Religious manifestations are the
necessary consequence of man's predisposition to believe in the
existence of an invisible, supernatural and miraculous world, a
predisposition which it has been possible to consider sometimes as a
reminiscence of an anterior state, sometimes as an intimation of a
future destiny" (_Traite de l'enchainement des idees fondamentales dans
les sciences et dans l'histoire_, Sec.
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