t. e. hulme, the religious attitude

7/22/2019 T. E. Hulme, The Religious Attitude

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SPECULATIONS

THE RELIGIOUS TTITUDEIN discussing the religious as contrastedwith the humanist attitude I said above :While it tends to find expression in mythit is independent of myth ; it is, however,much more intimately connected with dogma.I want to make this clearer by a more detailedaccount of what I mean by an attitude inthis context.

The main purpose of these pages is a practical one. I want to show that certain generally held principles are false. But theonly method of controversy in any suchfundamental matter of dispute is an abstract,, one; a method which deals with theabstract conceptions on which opinions reallyrest.You think A is true; I ask why. Youreply, that it follows from B. But Wily istrue ? because it follows from C, and so on.You get finally to some very abstract attitudeb) which you assume to be self-evidentlytrue. This is the central conception fromwhich more detailed opinion about politicalprinciples, for example, proceeds. Now ifyour opponent reasons correctly, and youare unable to show that he has falsely deducedA from B then you are driven to the abstract64

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HUMANISMplane of (h), for it is here that the differencebetween you really has its root. And it isonly on this abstract plane that a discussionon any fundamental divergence of opinioncan usefully be carried on.

Any attempt to change h), however, shouldbe prefaced by some account of the nature ofsuch abstract attitudes, and the process bywhich we come to adopt them.t is possible to trace, in every man smind, then, trains leading in various direc-

tions, from his detailed ethical and politicalopinions, back to a few of these centralattitudes.A B C h)

Instead, of the first concrete statementA is true, we might have A is good ;in which case h) would be an ultimate v lue ;the process, however, is the same. Anothermetaphor, by which we may describe the placeof h) in our thought, is to compare it to theaxes, to which W: refer the position of amoving point, or the framework, on which Aand B are based. This is, perhaps, a betterdescription, for the framework, inside whichwe live, is something we t ke for grantedand in ordinary life we are very seldom con-scious of (h). We are only led up to it bythis dialectical questioning, described above.

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SPECULATIONSAll our principles are based on some un-conscious framework of this kind. s arule, then, we are quite unconscious of (h),we are only conscious of the detailed principlesA and B derived from it. Now while weprobably acquire the opinions A and B con-sciously, the same is not true of (h). Howdo we come to hold it then ? For we didnot produce it ourselves, but derived itready made from society. It came to be anessential part of our mind without our beingconscious of it, because it was already im-plicit in all the more detailed opinions, A andB, society forced upon us. It was thusembedded in the actual matter of our thought,and as natural to us as the air ; in fact, it sthe air that all these more concrete beliefsbreathe. We thus have forced upon us,unconsciously, the whole apparatus of cate-gories, in terms of which all our thinkingmust be done. The result of h) having inthis way the character of a category, is thatit makes us see A) not as an opinion, but asa fact. We never see h) for we see all thingsthrou h h).In this way these abstract categories, ofcourse, l m t our thinking our thought iscompelled to move inside certain limits. Wefind, then, in people whose mental apparatusis based on h) while ours is not, a certainobstinacy of intellect, a radical opposition,and incapacity to see things which, to us, aresimple.


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HUMANISMNow the limitation imposed on our thinkingby such categories is sometimes quite legitimate. Some categories are objective. Wecannot think of things outside of space and

time and it is quite right that we are subjectto this limitation.ut h) often belongs to the large class ofpseudo-categories--categories which are notobjective and it is these that I wish to dealwith here. They are exceedingly importantfor the difference between the mentality ofone great period of history and anotherreally depends on the different pseudo-categories of this kind which were imposed onevery individual of the period and in termsof which his thinking was consequently done.It is not difficult to find examples of this.1) A Brazilian Indian told a missionarythat he was a red parrot. The missionaryendeavoured to give some explanation of thisstatement. You mean he said that whenyou die you will become a red parrot or thatyou are in some way related to this bird.The Indian rejected both these plausibleattempts to explain away a perfectly simplefact and repeated quite oldly that he wasa red parrot. There would seem to be animpasse here then ; the missionary wasbaffled in the same way as the humanist isby the conception of sin. The explanationgiven by Levy-Bruhl who quotes the story isthat the Indian has imposed on him by hisgroup a conception of the nature of an object6 ]


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HUMANISMeconomics, really depend on these centralabstract attitudes. ut while people willreadily acknowledge that this is true of theGreeks, or of Brazilian Indians, they haveconsiderable difficulty in realising that it isalso true of the modem humanist period fromthe Renaissance to now. The way n whichwe instinctively judge things we take to be theinevitable way of judging things. The pseudocategories of the humanist attitude are thoughtto be on the same footing as the objectivecategories of space and time. It is thoughtto be impossible for an emancipated man tothink sincerely in the categories of thereligious attitude.The reason for this is to be found in the factalready noticed that we are, as a rule, unconscious of the very abstract conceptions whichunderlie our more concrete opinions. WhatFerrier says of real categories, Categoriesmay be operative when their existence is notconsciously recognised. First principles ofevery kind have their influence, and, indeed,operate largely and profoundly long beforethey come to the surface of human thought,and are articulately expounded, is true alsoof these pseudo-categories. We are only conscious of A, B . . . and very seldom ofh). We do not see that, but other thingsthrough t and, consequently, take what ~see for facts, and not for what they r -opinions based on a particular abstract valuation. This is certainly true of the progr ssivg


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SPECUL TIONSideology founded on the conception of man asfundamentally good.

t is this unconsciousness of these centralabstract conceptions leading us to supposethat the judgments of value founded on themare natural and inevitable which makes it sodifficult for anyone in the humanist traditionto look at the religious attitude as anythingbut a sentimental survival.But I want to emphasise as clearly as I canthat I attach very little value indeed to thesentiments attaching to the religious attitude.I hold quite coldly and intellectually as itwere that the way of thinking about theworld and man the conception of sin and thecategories which ultimately make up thereligious attitude are the true categories andthe right way of thinking.I might incidentally note here that the wayin which I have explained the action of thecentral abstract attitudes and ways of thinking and the use of the word pseudo-categoriesmight suggest that I hold relativist viewsabout their validity. But I don t. I holdthe religious conception of ultimate values tobe right the humanist wrong. From thenature of things these categories are notinevitable like the categories of time andspace but are equally objective. In speakingof religion it is to this level of abstractionthat I wish to refer. I have none of thefeelings of nostalgia the reverence for tradition the desire to recapture the sentiment of

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HUMANISMFra Angelico which seems to animate mostmodern defenders of religion. All that seemsto me to be bosh. What is important iswhat nobody seems to realise-the dogmaslike that of Original Sin which are the closestexpression of the categories of the religiousattitude. That man is in no sense perfectbut a wretched creature who can yet apprehend perfection. t is not then that I putup with the dogma for the sake of the sentiment but that I may possibly swallow thesentiment for the sake of the dogma. Veryfew since the Renaissance have really understood the dogma certainly very few inside theChurches of recent years. f they appear c c ~sionally even fanatical about the very word ofthe dogma that is only a secondary result ofbelief really grounded on sentiment. Certainlyno humanist could understand the dogma.They all chatter about matters which are incomparison with this quite secondary notions-God Freedom and Immortality.

The important thing is that this attitudeis not merelv a contr sted attitude which Iam interested in as it were for purpose ofsymmetry in historical exposition but a realattitude perfectly possible for us to-day.To see this is a kind of conversion. t radically alters our physical perception; so thatthe world takes on an entirely differentaspect.I

t. e. hulme, the religious attitude

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