[161] That the increase of divorces is due chiefly to the initiative of the wife is seen in the fact that as they become more numerous an increasing proportion is granted at the instance of the woman. Under the old _régime_ the divorcing of a husband was almost unknown, the first case in England occurring in 1801. (See the essay on Marriage and Divorce in Mr. Bryce’s Studies in History and Jurisprudence.) In the United States a great preponderance are now granted to wives, and the greater the total rate the greater this preponderance. In those states where the rate is highest the proportion is from two-thirds to three-fourths. It is not far wrong to say that the old idea of divorce was to rid the husband of an unfaithful wife, the new is to rid the wife of an uncongenial or troublesome husband. CHAPTER XXXII DISORGANIZATION: THE CHURCH THE PSYCHOLOGICAL VIEW OF RELIGION—THE NEED OF SOCIAL STRUCTURE—CREEDS—WHY SYMBOLS TEND TO BECOME FORMAL—TRAITS OF A GOOD SYSTEM OF SYMBOLS—CONTEMPORARY NEED OF RELIGION—NEWER TENDENCIES IN THE CHURCH. In religion, too, our day is one of confusion in institutions and falling back upon human nature. The most notable books of the day in this field are, first of all, studies in religious psychology. Perceiving that the question has come to be one of the very being and function of religion, they ignore the discussion of particular doctrines, polities or sacraments, and seek a foundation in the nature of the human mind. I do not wish to follow these researches in detail: their general outcome is reassuring. They seem to show that religion is a need of human nature, centring, perhaps, in the craving to make life seem rational and good. As thought it is belief regarding the power underlying life and our relation to it; our conceptions of God and of other divine agents serving as symbols—changing like other symbols with the general state of thought—of this hidden reality. As feeling it is a various body of passion and sentiment associated with this belief; such as the sense of sin and of reconciliation; dread, awe, reverence, love and faith. And religious action is such as expresses, in one way or another, this sort of thought and feeling.