as real and
personal. Instead of adopting a changed attitude towards the world of
nature, he comes to demand a new world. He is now a denizen of the
spiritual world, and there results "a life of pure inwardness," which
draws its power and inspiration from the infinite resources of the
Universal Spiritual Life in which he finds his being. This type of
religion Eucken calls _Characteristic Religion_.

The historical religions would seem to represent, to some extent, the
attempts of humankind to arrive at a religion of this kind. A further
distinction arises between the historical forms of religion, of which
one at most, if any, can express the final truth, and the Absolute form
of religion, which if not yet conceived, must ultimately express the
truth in the matter of religion.

Eucken is never more brilliant than he is in the examination he makes of
the historical forms of religion, for the purpose of formulating the
Absolute and final form; some account of this must be given in the next
chapter.

CHAPTER VIII

RELIGION: HISTORICAL AND ABSOLUTE

In examining the various historical forms of religion, Eucken, as we
should expect, is governed by the conclusions he has arrived at
concerning the solution of the great problem of life, and especially of
the place of religion in life.

A religion which emphasised the need for a break with the world, and of
fight and action for spiritual progress, the possibility of a new higher
life of freedom and of personality, and the superiority of the spiritual
over the material, and which presented God as the ultimate spiritual
life, in which the human personality found its real self, would thus
meet with highest favour, while a form of religion that failed to do so
would necessarily fail to satisfy the tests that he would apply.

He does not spend time discussing various religions in detail, but deals
with them briefly in general, in order to show that the Christian
religion is far superior to all other religions, then he makes a
critical and very able examination of the Christian position. He
considers it necessary to discuss in detail only that form of religion
that is undoubtedly the highest.

The historical religions he finds to be of two types--religions of law
and religions of redemption. The religions of law portray God as a being
outside the world, and distinct from man, One who rules the world by
law, and who decrees that man shall obey certain laws of conduct