RELIGION is, shortly, the reaction of the human soul in
the presence of God. As God is as much a part of the environment of man as the
earth on which he stands, no man can escape from religion any more than he can
escape from gravitation. But though every man necessarily reacts to God, men
react of course diversely, each according to his nature, or perhaps we would
better say, each according to his temperament. Thus, broadly speaking, three
main types of religion arise, corresponding to the three main varieties of the
activity of the human spirit, intellectual, emotional, and voluntary. According
as the intellect, sensibility, or will is dominant in him, each man produces
for himself a religion prevailingly of the intellect, sensibility, or active
will; and all the religions which men have made for themselves find places
somewhere among these three types, as they produce themselves more or less
purely, or variously intermingle with one another.