A pioneer in modern research upon the origins of culture was asked recently whether his work had any bearing upon religion. He replied that it had, but that at present he was engaged merely in ‘getting the guns into position.’ The same answer might be given with regard to the probable consequences of recent progress in psychology, not only for religion but for the whole fabric of our traditional beliefs about ourselves. In many quarters there is a tendency to suppose that the series of attacks upon received ideas which began, shall we say, with Galileo and rose to a climax with Darwinism, has over-reached itself with Einstein and Eddington, and that the battle is now due to die down. This view seems to be too optimistic. The most dangerous of the sciences is only now beginning to come into action. I am thinking less of Psycho-analysis or of Behaviourism than of the whole subject which includes them. It is very probable that the Hindenburg Line to which the defence of our traditions retired as a result of the onslaughts of the last century will be blown up in the near future. If this should happen a mental chaos such as man has never experienced may be expected. We shall then be thrown back, as Matthew Arnold foresaw, upon poetry. It is capable of saving us; it is a perfectly possible means of overcoming chaos. But whether man is capable of the reorientation required, whether he can loosen in time the entanglement with belief which now takes from poetry half its power and would then take all, is another question, and too large for the scope of this essay. Footnotes [1] The view of the mind-body problem assumed here is defended and maintained with references to the contemporary authorities who hold it, in _The Meaning of Psychology_ by C. K. Ogden, Chapter II. (London, Kegan Paul; New York, Harpers; 1926.) [2] For a further discussion of attitudes see the author’s _Principles of Literary Criticism_, Chapter XV (International Library of Psychology). [3] See _The Foundations of Aesthetics_, by C. K. Ogden, James Wood and the author, pp. 74 ff. for a description of such experience. [4] _I.e._ thoughts which are both true and evidenced, in the narrower, stricter senses. For a discussion of some relevant senses of ‘truth’ and ‘knowledge’ see _Principles of Literary Criticism_, Chapters xxxiii and xxxiv. [5] On this point the study of the child’s questions included in _The Language and Thought of the Child_ by J. Piaget (Kegan Paul, 1926), is illuminating. [6] The remarks of Wittgenstein (_Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus_, 6.5, 6.52), which superficially resemble this, should be consulted, if only to show how important the _context_ of a statement may be; for what is said above should lead not towards but away from all forms of mysticism. [7] For an account of the various senses of truth and of the ways in which they may be distinguished in discussion cf. _The Meaning of Meaning_, by C. K. Ogden and the author, Chapters VII and X.