The purpose of this thesis is not to provide any of these. No attempt has been made to construct a valid and completely methodology, much less system, of the sociology of religion, either by primary research in, or observation of, the religious institutions and groupings, or by careful study or compilation of the theories and principles which have been advanced by other writers. Rather we have chosen to sample the literature of the field in an attempt to break down, plot out, and isolate into component elements many of the concepts which are with greater or lesser regularity used by writers in the field. In some cases we have tried to summarize the theories as a whole with the arguments advanced in their favor. But our major concern has been, in each case, to attempt an evaluation of the conclusions they have reached largely in respect to definition, assumptions, and method, hoping thereby to set down some basic requirements of, and perhaps a few methodological prolegomena to, a valid approach
