In all systems of worship man not only turns to his gods but does so in the conviction that he is returning, or trying to return, to them--trying to return to them, because they have been estranged, and access to them is therefore difficult. Accordingly, he draws near to them, bearing in his hands something intended to express his desire to return to them. The material, external symbol of his desire--the oblation, offering or sacrifice which he brings with him because it expresses his desire--is that on which at first his attention centres. And because his attention centres on it, the rite of sacrifice, the outward ceremony, develops in ways already described. The object of the rite is to procure access to the god; and the greater the extent to which attention is concentrated on the right way of performing the external acts and the outward ceremony, the less attention is bestowed upon the inward purpose which accompanies the outward actions, and for the sake of which those external actions are performed. As the object of the rite is to procure access, it seems to follow that the proper performance of the rite will ensure the access desired. The reason why access is sought, at all, is the belief--arising on occasions when calamity visits the community--that the god has been estranged, and the faith that he may yet become reconciled to his worshippers. The reason why his wrath descends, in the shape of calamities, upon the community, is that the community, in the person of one of its members, has offended the god, by breaking the custom of the community in some way. For this reason--in this belief and faith--access is sought, by means of the sacrificial rite; and the purpose of the rite is assumed to be realised by the performance of the ceremonies, in which the outward rite consists. The meaning and the value of the outward ceremonies consists in the desire for reconciliation which expresses itself in the acts performed; and the mere performance of the acts tends of itself to relieve the desire. That is why the covenant-theory of sacrifice gains acceptance: it represents--it is an official representation--that performance of the sacrificial ceremony is all that is required, by the terms of the agreement, to obtain reconciliation and to effect atonement. But the representation is found to be a misrepresentation: the desire for reconciliation and atonement is not to be satisfied by outward ceremonies, but by hearkening and obedience. 'To obey is better than sacrifice and to hearken than the fat of rams.' Sacrifice remains the outward rite, but it is pronounced to have value only so far as it is an expression of the spirit of obedience. Oblations are vain unless the person who offers them is changed in heart, unless there is an inward, spiritual process, of which the external ceremony is an expression. Though this was an interpretation of the meaning of the sacrificial rite which was