ABSTRACT
Religion is, among many other things, a system of education, by means of which human beings may train themselves, first, to make desirable changes in their own personalities and, at one remove, in society and, in the second place, to heighten consciousness and so establish more adequate relations between themselves and the universe of which they are parts. It is impossible to discuss the value of rites and symbolic ceremonials without reopening a question touched upon in the chapters on Inequality and Education: the question of psychological types and degrees of mental development. The history of ideas is to a great extent the history of the misinterpretation of ideas. To create a ritual, as Comte did, in the hope that it will create a religious emotion, is to put the cart before the horse. Most savage peoples and even certain devotees of the higher religions make use of repeated rhythmical movement as a method of inducing unusual states of mind.
