A _positive_ religion however must be carefully distinguished from a _political_ religion. The former has for its end merely the correction and accurate definition of knowledge, that is, _instruction_ regarding the first cause: and the knowledge is communicated to another, according to the measure of his capacity, just as it has been received. But the latter has for its end mainly the welfare of the state. Knowledge is therefore communicated, not just as it has been received, but only in so far as it is found serviceable to this end. Politics, merely as politics, requires to concern itself about _true religion_ as little as about _true morality_. The injury, that might arise from this, can be prevented by other means which influence men at the same time, and thus all can be kept in equilibrium. Every political religion is therefore at the same time positive, but every positive religion is not also political. Natural religion has no _mysteries_ any more than merely positive religion. For there is no mystery implied in one man being unable to communicate his knowledge to another of defective capacity with the same degree of completeness which he himself has attained; otherwise mysteries might be attributed to all the sciences, and there would then be _mysteries of mathematics_ as well as _mysteries of religion_. Only _political religion_ can have mysteries, in order to lead men in an indirect way to the attainment of the _political end_, inasmuch as they are made to believe that thereby they can best attain their _private ends_, though this is not always in reality the case. There are _lesser_ and _greater_ mysteries in the political religions. The former consist in the _material_ knowledge of all particular operations and their connection with one another. The latter, on the contrary, consist in the knowledge of the _form_, that is, of the end by which the former are determined. The former constitute the totality of the _laws of religion_, but the latter contains the _spirit of the laws_. The _Jewish religion_, even at its earliest origin among the nomadic patriarchs, is already distinguished from the _heathen_ as _natural religion_, inasmuch as, instead of the _many comprehensible_ gods of heathenism, the _unity of an incomprehensible_ God lies at its foundation. For as the particular causes of the effects, which in general give rise to a religion, are in themselves unknown, and we do not feel justified in transferring to the causes the attributes of the particular effects, in order thereby to characterise them, there remains nothing but the idea of cause in general, which must be related to all effects without distinction. This cause cannot even be _analogically_ determined by the effects. For the effects are opposed to one another, and neutralise each other even in the same object. If therefore we ascribed them all to one and the same cause, the cause could not be analogically determined by any.