Generally speaking, the course of this antithesis in history is that Thought first of all comes forth within Religion, as not free and in separate manifestations. Secondly, it strengthens itself, feels itself to be resting upon itself, holds and conducts itself inimically towards the other form, and does not recognize itself therein. In the third place, it concludes by acknowledging itself as in this other. Or else Philosophy has to begin with carrying on its work entirely on its own account, isolating Thought from all popular beliefs, and taking for itself quite a different field of operation, a field for which the world of ordinary ideas lies quite apart, so that the two exist peacefully side by side, or, to put it better, so that no reflection on their opposition is arrived at. Just as little did the thought of reconciling them occur, since in the popular beliefs the same content appeared as in any external form other than the notion—the thought that is, of explaining and justifying popular belief, in order thus to be able again to express the conceptions of free thought in the form of popular religion. Thus we see Philosophy first restrained and confined within the range of the Greek heathen world; then resting upon itself, it goes forth against popular religion and takes up an unfriendly attitude to it, until it grasps that religion in its innermost and recognizes itself therein. Thus the ancient Greek philosophers generally respected the popular religion, or at least they did not oppose it, or reflect upon it. Those coming later, including even Xenophanes, handled popular ideas most severely, and thus many so-called atheists made their appearance. But as the spheres of popular conception, and abstract thought stood peacefully side by side, we also find Greek philosophers of even a later period in development, in whose case speculative thought and the act of worship, as also the pious invocation upon and sacrifice to the gods, coexist in good faith, and not in mere hypocrisy. Socrates was accused of teaching other gods than those belonging to the popular religion; his _δαιμόνιον_ was indeed opposed to the principles of Greek morals and religion, but at the same time he followed quite honestly the usages of his religion, and we know besides that his last request was to ask his friends to offer a cock to Æsculapius—a desire quite inconsistent with his conclusions regarding the existence of God and above all regarding morality. Plato declaimed against the poets and their gods. It was in a much later time that the Neo-platonists first recognized in the popular mythology rejected earlier by the philosophers, the universal content; they transposed and translated it into what is significant for thought, and thus used mythology itself as a symbolical imagery for giving expression to their formulas.