God” meant to a believer. It was not the God of the 
philosophers—of Erasmus, for example; it was not an idea, an 
abstract notion, a mere moral allegory. It was a terrible power,  
manifested in the divine wrath.” Eliade then explains his project: 
“The aim of the following pages is to illustrate and define this 
opposition between sacred and profane.” Sensing that “the 
modern Occidental experiences a certain uneasiness before 
many manifestations of the sacred,” as when, “for many 
human beings, the sacred can be manifested in stones or 
trees,” he proposes to show why man “of the archaic societies 
tends to live as much as possible in  the sacred or in close 
proximity to consecrated objects”:

          Our chief concern in the following pages will be to 
     elucidate this subject—to show in what ways religious 
     man attempts to remain as long as possible in a sacred