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The Religious Geniuses Of All Ages Have Been Distinguished By This Kind Of Religious Feeling, Which Knows No Dogma And No God Conceived In Man's Image; So That There Can Be No Church Whose Central Teachings Are Based On It. Hence It Is Precisely Among The Heretics Of Every Age That We Find Men Who Were Filled With This Highest Kind Of Religious Feeling And Were In Many Cases Regarded By Their Contemporaries As Atheists, Sometimes Also As Saints. Looked At In This Light, Men Like Democritus, Francis Of Assisi, And Spinoza Are Closely Akin To One Another.

In Their Struggle For The Ethical Good, Teachers Of Religion Must Have The Stature To Give Up The Doctrine Of A Personal God.

Intelligence Makes Clear To Us The Interrelationship Of Means And Ends. But Mere Thinking Cannot Give Us A Sense Of The Ultimate And Fundamental Ends. To Make Clear These Fundamental Ends And Valuations And To Set Them Fast In The Emotional Life Of The Individual, Seems To Me Precisely The Most Important Function Which Religion Has To Form In The Social Life Of Man.

What The Individual Can Do Is To Give A Fine Example, And To Have The Courage To Uphold Ethical Values .. In A Society Of Cynics.

It Is A Very Grave Mistake To Think That The Enjoyment Of Seeing And Searching Can Be Promoted By Means Of Coercion And A Sense Of Duty.