Renouvier’s own statements in his philosophy, in so far as these concern religion and theology, are in harmony with his rejection of the Absolute in philosophy and the Absolute in politics. His criticism of the idea of God, the central point in any philosophy of religion, is in terms similar to his critique of the worship of the Absolute or the deification of the State. In dealing with the question of a “Total Synthesis” Renouvier indicated his objections to the metaphysical doctrine of an Absolute, which is diametrically opposed to his general doctrine of relativity. He is violently in conflict with all religious conceptions which savour of this Absolute or have a pantheistic emphasis, which would diminish the value and significance of relativity and of personality. The “All-in-All” conception of God, which represents the pantheistic elements in many theologies and religions, both Christian and other, is not really a consciousness, he shows, for consciousness itself implies a relation, a union of the self and non-self. In such a conception actor, play and theatre all blend into one, God alone is real, and he is unconscious, for there is, according to this hypothesis, nothing outside himself which he can know. Renouvier realises that he is faced with the ancient problem of the One and the Many, with the alternative of unity or plurality. With his usual logical decisiveness Renouvier posits plurality. He does not attempt to reconcile the two opposites, and he deals with the problem in the manner in which he faced the antinomies of Kant. Both cannot be true, and the enemy of pantheism and absolutism acclaims pluralism, both for logical reasons and in order to safeguard the significance of personality. In particular he directly criticises the philosophy of Spinoza in which he sees the supreme statement of this philosophy of the eternal, the perfect, necessary, unchanging One, who is the same yesterday, to-day and forever. He admits that the idea of law or a system of laws leads to the introduction of something approaching the hypothesis of unity, but he is careful to show by his doctrine of freedom and personality that this is only a limited unity and that, considered even from a scientific standpoint, a Total Synthesis, which is the logical outcome of such an hypothesis, is ultimately untenable. He overthrows the idols of Spinoza and Hegel. Such absolutes, infinite and eternal, whether described as an infinite love which loves itself or a thought thinking thought, are nothing more to Renouvier than vain words, which it is absurd to offer as “The Living God.”