William Ernest Hocking - Religion Quotes

4 Sourced Quotes

View all William Ernest Hocking Quotes

We are driven to confess that we actually care more for religion than we do for religious theories and ideas: and in merely making that distinction between religion and its doctrine-elements, have we not already relegated the latter to an external and subordinate position? Have we not asserted that "religion itself" has some other essence or constitution than mere idea or thought?

William Ernest Hocking

What our view of the effectiveness of religion in history does at once make evident as to its nature is—first, its necessary distinction; second, its necessary supremacy. These characters though external have been so essential to its fruitfulness, as to justify the statement that without them religion is not religion. A merged religion and a negligible or subordinate religion are no religion.

William Ernest Hocking

And indeed, no man has found his religion until he has found that for which he must sell his goods and his life.

William Ernest Hocking

Religion is bound up in the difference between the sense of ignorance and the sense of mystery: the former means, "I know not"; the latter means "I know not; but it is known."

William Ernest Hocking