‘Archæological interests are no doubt most praiseworthy, but one does not set about an excavation if one is thereby going to undermine occupied dwelling-places so that they collapse and bury the inhabitants under their ruins. The doctrines of religion are not a subject that one can be clever about, as one can about any other. Our culture is built up on them; the preservation of human society rests on the assumption that the majority of mankind believe in the truth of these doctrines. If they are taught that there is no almighty and all just God, no divine world order, and no future life, then they will feel exempt from all obligation to follow the rules of culture. Uninhibited and free from fear, everybody will follow his asocial, egoistic instincts, and will seek to prove his power. Chaos, which we have banished through thousands of years of the work of civilization, will begin again. Even if one knew, and could prove, that religion was not in possession of the truth, one should conceal the fact and behave as the philosophy of “As If” demands—and this in the interests of the preservation of everybody. And apart from the danger of the undertaking, it is also a purposeless cruelty. Countless people find their one consolation in the doctrines of religion, and only with their help can they endure life. You would rob them of what supports them, and yet you have nothing better to give them in exchange. It has been admitted that so far science has not achieved much, but even if it had advanced far further, it would not suffice for men. Man has yet other imperative needs, which can never be satisfied by cold science, and it is very strange—to be frank, it is the acme of inconsistency—that a psychologist who has always emphasized how much in men’s lives the intelligence retreats before the life of the instincts should now strive to rob men of a precious wish-satisfaction, and should want to give them in exchange a compensation of an intellectual nature.’ What a number of accusations all at once! However, I am prepared to deny them all; and what is more, I am prepared to defend the statement that culture incurs a greater danger by maintaining its present attitude to religion than by relinquishing it. But I hardly know where to begin my reply.