For my religion is my sense of a practical situation, and only when that has been proved to be folly has my religion become untrue. My God is my practical faith, my plan of salvation. My religion is overthrown if I am convinced that I have misconceived the situation and mistaken what I should do to be saved. The conception of God is very simple practically, and very complex theoretically, a fact that confirms its practical genesis. My conception of God contains _an idea of my own interests_, _an idea of the disposition of the universe toward my interests_, and _some working plan for the reconciliation of these two terms_. These three elements form a practical unity, but each is capable of emphasis, and a religion may be transformed through the modification of any one of them. It appears, then, as has always been somewhat vaguely recognized, that the truth of religion is ethical as well as metaphysical or scientific. My religion will be altered by a change in my conception of what constitutes my real interest, a change in my conception of the fundamental causes of reality, or a change in my conception of the manner in which my will may or may not affect these causes. God is neither an entity nor an ideal, but always a relation of entity to ideal: _reality regarded from the stand-point of its favorableness or unfavorableness to human life, and prescribing for the latter the propriety of a certain attitude_.
[Sidenote: Historical Examples of Religious Truth and Error. The Religion of Baal.]
§ 31. The range of historical examples is limitless, but certain of these are especially calculated to emphasize the application of a criterion to religion. Such is the case with Elijah's encounter with the prophets of Baal, as narrated in the Old Testament.
"And Elijah came near unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? If Yahweh be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him. . . . And call ye on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of Yahweh: and the God that answereth by fire, let him be God. . . . And Elijah said unto the prophets of Baal, Choose you one bullock for yourselves, and dress it first; for ye are many; and call on the name of your god, but put no fire under. And they took the bullock which was given them, and they dressed it, and called on the name of Baal from morning even until noon, saying, O Baal, hear us. But there was no voice, nor any that answered. . . . And it came to pass at noon, that Elijah mocked them, and said, Cry aloud: for he is a god; either he is musing, or he is gone aside, or he is in a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awaked. And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lances, till the blood gushed out upon them. . . . But there was neither voice, nor any to answer, nor any that regarded."[88:2]