Translated from the Dutch of J. H. Scholten, PROFESSOR AT LEYDEN, BY FRANCIS T. WASHBURN. Reprinted by permission from "The Religious Magazine and Monthly Review." BOSTON: CROSBY & DAMRELL, 100 WASHINGTON ST. 1870....

The conception of religion presupposes, a , God as object; b , man as subject; c , the mutual relation existing between them. According to the various stages of development which men have reached, religious belief manifests itself either in the form of a passive feeling of dependence, where the subject, not yet conscious of his independence, feels himself wholly overmastered by the deity, or the object of worship, as by a power outside of and opposed to himself; or, when the feeling of independe

FETICHISM. THE CHINESE. THE EGYPTIANS. 1. FETICHISM. The lowest stage of religious development is fetichism, as it is found among the savage tribes of the polar regions, and in Africa, America, and Australia. In this stage, man's needs are as yet very limited and exclusively confined to the material world. Still too little developed intellectually to worship the divine in nature and her powers, he thinks he sees the divinity which he seeks in every unknown object which strikes his senses, or whi

THE ARIAN NATIONS. 1. THE EAST ARIANS. THE INDIANS. In the development of religion among the Indians, the following periods may be distinguished:— a. The original Veda-religion. b. The priestly religion of the Brahmins. c. The philosophical speculation. d. Buddhism. e. The modified Brahminism after Buddha, in connection with the worship of Vishnu and Siva. a. The original Veda-religion. The original religion of Arya originated in Bactria. From thence, before the time of Zoroaster, it was brought