ily one glides into the other very
little observation of life or study of history will show. The language
of devotion and of amatory passion is often identical, and seems to
serve equally well for either purpose. The significance of this fact is
often obscured by our having etherealised the conception of love, and so
losing sight of its physiological basis. And, having hidden it from
sight, we, not unnaturally, fail to give it due consideration. This is,
in its way, a fatal blunder. The sex life of man and woman is too large
a fact and too pervasive a force to be ignored with safety. Ignorance
combined with prudery conspires to perpetuate what ignorance alone
began; and the sex life, in both its normal and abnormal manifestations,
has been perpetually exploited in the interests of supernaturalism.

The evidence that may be adduced in favour of what has been said is
vast, and covers a wide range. Historically it covers such facts as the
relations between primitive religious beliefs and the sexual life, and
the multiplication of sects of a markedly erotic character during
periods of religious enthusiasm. "Even the most casual students of
religion," says Professor G. B. Cutten, "must have observed an
apparently intimate connection between religious and sexual emotions,
and not a few have read with amazement the abnormal cults which have had
the sexual element as a foundation for their denominational
dissent."[67] A phenomenon so striking as to force itself on the notice
of the most 'casual students' raises the presumption that the relation
between the two sets of facts is rather more than that of 'apparent'
intimacy. When in the course of history two things appear together over
and over again, one is surely justified in assuming that there is some
underlying principle responsible for the association. The search for
this principle leads to the next class of evidence--the psychological.
In this we are concerned with the relation between the sexual feelings
and the religious idea, an association not always expressed through the
comparatively harmless medium of language. And, finally, we have the
evidence derived from pathology, where we are able to discern a
perverted sexuality masquerading as religious fervour.

In a previous chapter there has been pointed out the kind of mental
environment in which primitive man moves. As one of the earliest forms
of systematised thinking, religion dominates all other forms of mental
activ