The Meaning And Value Of Mysticism And Creative Prayer

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THE MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM

6V

THE

.UUa

MEANING AND VALUE

IVio

OF MYSTICISM

E."

HERMAN

AUTHOR OF "EUCKEN AND BERGSON

LONDON JAMES CLARKE & CO., 13 &

14

'

FLEET STREET

M. H.

It

is

assumed that the English character

we have no sympathy

is

alien

to

Mysticism

The

— that

do There is no race, I think, in which there is a richer vein of idealism, and a deeper sense of the mystery of life, than our own. And so far from it being true that Great Britain has produced but few mystics, the subject might be adequately studied from English writers alone. On the more intellectual side we have (without going back not bear out

devotional mystics ;

facts

this view.

to Scotus Erigena)

Norwich

as a nation for this kind of religion.

the Cambridge Platonists,

we have

Law and

Coleridge

;

of

attractive examples in Hilton and Julian of

while in verse the lofty idealism and strong religious bent of

our race have produced a series of poet-mystics such as no other country can

rival.

Dean

Inge.

PREFACE It has become a platitude to speak of a mystical revival, but so far

has been a revival of interest in

it

Mysticism rather than of Mysticism of the

itself.

In spite

remarkable output of literature on Mysticism

we have few first-hand who can speak with authority and not as the scribes. Nor are there any indications of a revival of mystical religion among

within the last few years, mystics

among

us,

very few

" the simple and the pure, into whose hearts Truth falls like

dew

Such a revival

into a fleece of wool."

was, indeed, hoped for by

many

as a result of the

general reaction from ecclesiastical authority traditional

theology,

and

but up to the present these

On

expectations have not been realised.

the con-

trary, the weakening of traditional bonds has been accompanied by an alarming degree of spiritual mediocrity, strangely yoked to a superficial spiritual alertness and power of assimilation which create the impression of an age " haunted by the Unseen." Never was there such a stinging curiosity abroad regarding the most private sanctities of the spiritual life.

Conversion,

prayer,

" interior

lection, contemplation, vision,

investigated of

by mixed

the

multitudes

quiet,"

life

recol-

beyond, are

with

a

blend

Athenian inquisitiveness and pathetic credulity.

Mysticism has become a word to conjure with, and vii

PREFACE any and everything that is sweetly unreasonable or piquantly obscure is welcomed in its name and exalted Here to the dignity of a more or less esoteric cult. and there we have felt the first stirrings of a yet unborn movement towards genuine Mysticism, but the most salient characteristic of the situation as a whole has been a

fatal quickness of superficial appre-

which mistakes its enjoyment of the report an experience for the possession of its reality. But with the sudden outbreak of war new possibilities have entered into the situation, and what was curiosity, or, at most, a vague wistfulness, is being purged and transformed into a new wonder, a deep hunger and thirst for Reality. Much was talked in the days before the war about the delusion and peril of a materialistic civilisation and the refuge which " the simple life " and " the mystic quest " offered to ciation

of

and wearied

disillusionised

We

a vital conviction.

To-day what was

spirits.

then an armchair philosophy

is

being deepened into

see in the case of

Germany

a

great materialistic civilisation, which has dared to be true to

its

ruthless

We know now

—that

dying of

its

own

brutal logic.

a materialistic system cannot survive in a

spiritual universe

which

self,

what once we merely theorised about

man

;

that

we

are set in a world in alone, even

though

each loaf be guaranteed by a militarist State.

More-

cannot

live

by bread

over, this grim apocalypse of a nation

which has

clothed brute force with the philosopher's mantle

and the preacher's gown has most

effectually shattered

the cherished superstition that "

what a man

believes."

To viii

it

doesn't matter

read essays upon the

PREFACE beauty of ideas, the power one thing

of ideals

and

of dreams,

to feel their explosive force, as

;

we

is

are

Our reassuring confeeling it now, is quite another. viction as to the futility of " mere " thought and our brave contempt of the professorial mind have been broken against the rock of history. The pragmatist

He has

has seen the impossible happen.

seen abstract

theories do concrete damage, and " pure " thought blast the foundations of a world.

And

out of this

sudden, ruthless shattering of our pragmatist there will spring, not, indeed, a

new

intellectualism,

but a rehabilitation of the higher Reason.

And

it is

the due honouring of this higher Reason that

in

Mysticism will at For, say

last

what we

come will.

its own. Mysticism can thrive on

into

pragmatist, voluntarist, or intuitionalist as

fiction,

it

soil as little

could thrive in the stony ground of intellecTrue,

tualism.

intuitionalists

;

the

great

mystics were

certainly

nevertheless they were the product

Platonism, which Reason was " king." Scholasticism, the Renaissance these were the back-

of ages in

—

ground of the mystic portrait, and it is only out of such a background of speculative thought and intelIntuition lectual struggle that Mysticism can arise. degeneration, morbid sinks swiftly to decadence and unless it grows a magic blossom on the tough stalk One much-needed conviction will emerge of intellect. out of the present upheaval as life

— that

it

is

it

affects our spiritual

sheer futility to oppose the mystical

to the intellectual or institutional elements of religion, as claiming

sion

and

an exclusive right to spiritual apprehen" There is no such thing as a " pure

fruition.

ix

PREFACE mystic

where he

;

pathology.

If the

he belongs to the realm of

exists,

great clash of ideas teaches us

that the thing that matters most

thing that matters

—

is

behind the brain that

deep roots in

its

I believe,

the only

that strange, mysterious

cries

life

out for the living God,

also teaches us that that interior

but has

—nay,

many

life is

it

not isolated,

worlds.

then, that out of the confusion

and

bitter

mental anguish that cloud our souls to-day there is arising a deep and genuine desire for contact with the

humble and resolute purpose to have done with pretty illusions and to grip Reality with naked hands. More especially will men everywhere begin Eternal, a

to respond to the message of a truly Christian Mysti-

cism

—that

with God

a Mysticism

is,

is

whose passion

for

intimacy

checked by the Christian sense of

sin,

based upon a deeply ethical conception of salvation

and

and born of a vision of God as He is Sudden contact with grim realities

sanctity,

in Christ Jesus.

may, and very

likely will,

make men even

less tolerant

and theological conventions than they but it will likewise make them more the preciosity, mock esotericism, and

of ecclesiastical

were before, suspicious of

cheap transcendentalism of fashionable, heterodox

and

more open to the appeal of an experience of spiritual immediacy founded upon the realities of the Christian Gospel. The present book is based upon such a reading of the situation. In the many volumes on Mysticism which have appeared recently, one of two methods has been followed the historical or the psychological. Both are

cults,

far

—

indispensable for our understanding of the subject,

X

PREFACE but each taken by

itself

has

its

grave disadvantages.

The historical method, in presenting the great mystics embedded, as it were, in the matrix of their times, tends to regard Mysticism as indissolubly bound up with certain classic forms and definite theological and philosophical presuppositions. The psychological method, on the other hand, based upon a timelessness of Mysticism which makes Plotinus the true contemporary of Francis Thompson, is apt to leave us with a vague abstraction.

two,

if

rigidly followed, tells us

great mystical heritage available for generation, and

how

to link

it

Neither of the

make the our own day and

how

up to the

to

plastic, living

movements of the present time. In this book I have endeavoured to suggest the meaning and value of Mysticism for our day. My conviction that Mysticism is essentially a spirit and not a system, or even a method, has precluded anything like a detailed appHcation of mystical principles

movements of to-day. But I have at all points tried to show how the mystical element may be brought to bear upon the Christian thought and life of to-day, and to suggest where its dynamic and transmuting power can go to shape the Christian thought and life of to-morrow. the

to

I

have thought

it

well to devote the

first

five

chapters entirely to the elucidation of the nature of Mysticism, the resolving of some of its inherent anti-

nomies, and the removal of

and ambiguities which stand discussion. cal mystic,

difficulties,

in the

way

obscurities,

of intelligent

These are followed by a study

my

choice falling xi

of a typi-

upon Blessed Angela de

PREFACE Foligno as exhibiting the characteristic weaknesses as

The

well as the characteristic strength of Mysticism.

remaining

five

chapters deal with the relation of

Mysticism

to Nature, Philosophy and Theology. In the discussion of the mystical attitude to Nature, Asceticism and its significance for us to-day is specially

considered

;

Philosophy deals, inter rience

and

chapter on Mysticism

the

intuition

alia,

to

treating of Mysticism

and

with the relation of expesynthesis.

intellectual

and Theology, the problem

In of

the relation of Mysticism to Eschatology seemed to

demand

a chapter to

have tried to prove the only solution of the eschatological problem, and how, on the other, that problem is not solved, but rather itself.

In

I

it

show how, on the one hand, Mysticism

will

aggravated, by a total transmutation of eschatology into Mysticism.

In this connection

I

have attempted

a brief discussion of the obscure doctrine of the Holy Assembly or Interior Church, which seems to me to have an unexplored eschatological reference. I have added a brief annotated Bibliography for the con-

venience of those to

whom

an exhaustive

list

would

only prove confusing.

need hardly say that I make no claim to exhaustive Within the prescribed limits of a volume such as this, one can only offer a broad and suggestive I

treatment.

presentation of a subject, any one aspect of which

would need a whole volume exposition.

for its full

Mysticism and Theology, where

I

to suggest lines of thought which at

and detailed

This applies especially to the section on

some future time. xii

I

have endeavoured hope to elaborate

PREFACE My

indebtedness to previous writers

siderable,

and

I

wish

first

and foremost

is

very con-

to record

my

deep obligation to Dean Inge, to whose writings on

owe my first insight into the subject. would couple an earlier writer, Professor Alexander V. G. Allen, whose well-known book. The Mysticism

With him

I

I

Continuity of Christian Thought, exercised a formative

and permanent influence upon

common with

have also, in to acknowledge penetrative writers to

my

work

all

my

thinking.

I

students of Mysticism,

indebtedness to the erudite and

of

Baron von

Hiigel.

whom I owe much stimulus,

Of other

both by

way

of

fruitful suggestion and by the provocation of dissent, I would specially mention Dr. Rufus M. Jones and Miss Evelyn Underhill. The names of many others of whose work I have availed myself are referred to in the body of the book. My warmest thanks are due to the Rev. Ivor J.

Roberton, M.A., for his kindness in reading the proofs and for

many

valuable suggestions.

E. H. London,

.

October, 1915.

XIU

CONTENTS CHAPTER

Introductory

...... CHAPTER

I

.

19

.

43

III

The Psychic Phenomena of Mysticism CHAPTER

i

II

The Nature of Mystic Apprehension CHAPTER

PAGE

IV

The Contemplative Ideal

...

69

CHAPTER V

.......

Some Elements of Life

the Contemplative

CHAPTER

A

FoLIGNO

VI

......

Typical Mystic

:

105

Blessed Angela de

CHAPTER Mysticism and Nature

:

VII

Asceticism

XV

139

167

CHAPTER Mysticism and Nature

:

VIII

Symbolism

CHAPTER

I

INTRODUCTORY No word more

in our

language

—not

even " Socialism "

—has

been employed

loosely than " Mysticism."

Dean The religious

feeling

in its transformations,

is

a fact

but

Inge.

which psychology simply analyses and follows incompetent in the matter of its objective

it is

value.

RiBOT.

SYNOPSIS The appeal

of

Mysticism

—

Its

historical

present-day revival of interest in Mysticism the

new

religion

:

function

—The

the influence of

psychology and the study of comparative The need for a valid intellectual appreciation of

religious

—

A

failure to fundamental misunderstanding and its form and background This confusion strengthened by the new psychological interpretation of Mysticism The psychological method to be supplemented by the historical Its reducing and abstracting character Dr. Rufus M. Jones on psychology Psychology a science of origins, not of validity, II. The weakness of the psychological method illustrated from Leuba's

Mysticism.

I.

:

distinguish between the mystical experience

—

—

—

A

Psychological

Study

of

Religion

—

—Arbitrary distinction —

between metaphysical and empirical theology Psychology discredited by attempts to usurp function of metaphysics The criteria of religious experience outside the realm of psychology Miss Underhill's application of the psychological method to Jesus and St. Paul. III. Difhculty of defining Mysticism Questions to be Contradictory definitions answered in subsequent chapters.

— —

—

CHAPTER

I

INTRODUCTORY Beneath

the currents which

by action and reaction

have gone to shape Christian thought there sounds, Hke the fabled sunken bell, the strain of Mysticism. Thrust down by victorious institutional, rational and moralistic forces, the mystic note floats up from

—

now muffled, now clear. Every now and again the penalty of success overtakes the ruling system, and Christian men, disillusioned of a hollow civilisation and an externalised Church, listen to the submerged melody and find it a song of deliverance and out of such moments of reaction are born the great spiritual movements, whether explicitly mystical or only showing deep affinities with Mysticism. Thus out of the protest against a young Church already secularised and hardened into inflexibility there came Montanism with its wild prophetic passion, to die and to reappear again and again in divers forms throughout the course of Church history. Thus in a time of unparalleled spiritual and moral bankthe depths

;

ruptcy, when the corruptions of the Church, the " Babylonish Captivity," the great Civil War and the

Black Death conspired to wean the soul from the intoxicating

attune

it

rhythm

to the

and affairs and upon the horizon,

of external cults

murmur

of eternity

that most elastic and elusive of mystical groups, the

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM Friends of God, came into existence.

when

Again,

the new-born Reformation theology tended to exhaust in

itself

the correction of abuses

Rome and met men

polemic against

and a negative in revolt against

the external authority of a Church with the no less

external authority of a book and a creed, the socalled " spiritual reformers " bequeathed to a Church

which *'

and inward

despised

a religion of

new

foundations of a

And

persecuted life

them

and power,"

only

not

but also the

theology.

to-day once more a silence of disillusionment

and misgiving has fallen upon the human spirit, and in the most unlikely quarters men are wondering if there be not some unguessed balm of healing, some transcendent word of liberation, in the dim and unfamiliar depth of mystical religion. Once more the spectacle of a tragically successful materialistic civilisation

dying in blood and

fire is

shattering the

delusions of a shallow and complacent optimism and driving us back upon the deeps of the soul where

God speaks His

creative

And

and redeeming Word.

while this return upon the inwardness of things

is

not general in the sense of being a popular movement,

and so often found in places over to the most naked materialseemed given which ism that it may be argued with conviction that we it

is

so widely spread

are on the verge of a true revival of mystical religion.

What

precise

form

is

not

see, it is

not

this revival will take it

As to conform to any

one can

easy to conjecture.

far as

likely

clear-cut type

—at any

rate,

It will follow not the developments. " mechanism of the mystic way," but the spirit, which,

in its initial

4

INTRODUCTORY no one schema, links the severe and cultivated insight of a St. John of the Cross to the homely

bound

to

Anna Bunston's Wiltshire peasant who communes with God under his apple tree. That the new interest in Mysticism has thrown the door wide vision of Miss

fostered

charlatan and the pseudo-adept, and has a craze for the " supernatural " in which

a

Athenian

for

the

cold

curiosity

and a bhnd pathetic

credulity are strangely mingled, need not cause us to

look askance at the present renascence of mystical

Such amateur cults are the inevitable excrescences of a deep and genuine movement towards feeling.

spiritual reality.

Of positive elements which have contributed to a revived interest in Mysticism two must be mentioned the new religious psychology and the study of comparative religion. The first brought unexpected support to a theology based upon the reality, autonomy, and self-evident character of the religious

—

experience

towards a

;

the second, while superficially tending

false tolerance,

has really gone to demon-

strate the uniqueness of Christianity. it

upon us that the aim and

religions

is

communion with

In impressing

vital impulse of all

the Unseen and

the

the study of comparative religion serves throw those elements in Christianity which make it the religion of ethical and spiritual communion with God into sharp relief against the many muddy and sterile factors that stultify the influence of the Eternal,

to

great ethnic religions.

But while a present-day

revival

Mysticism must be accepted as a 5

of

fact, it

interest

in

remains to

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM how much

ask

of

it

merely the unconsidered

is

sympathy of minds touched with a vague mystic feeHng and ready to accept as genuine Mysticism anything that ministers to their mood, often mistaking an instinct reality,

for spiritual

and how much

beauty is

based upon a valid appre-

The

ciation of Mysticism.

for a vision of spiritual

intellectual element needs

special emphasis here, for while

it

is

quite obvious

that the humblest and most untutored soul with a genius for spiritual reality loftiest

may

be a mystic of the

type without any explicitly intellectual con-

ception of the nature of Mysticism,

is

it

equally

clear that a juster intellectual appreciation of is

really

involved

in

Mysticism

may

curious metamorphosis of opinion.

what in

a

In some cases

it

result

would convert the uninformed enthusiast into a cold critic in others it would transform the prejudiced ;

decrier into a sympathetic inquirer.

No

subject

is

more impenetrably hedged about with difficulties, ambiguities and misunderstandings, and any treatment of Mysticism which is to be of genuine service must begin with an attempt to resolve some of the main difficulties which beset the average student.

I

To

begin with a fundamental source of misunder-

standing.

Mysticism stands primarily for a religious

it also, at any rate in its historical form and development, involves certain philosophical it has, in fact, a and theological presuppositions history and a background. The inevitable result is

experience, but

:

6

INTRODUCTORY that

many who

who

are repelled

by the mystical experience, but by the philosophy and theology

live

underlying the classical forms of Mysticism, frankly declare themselves averse to

it

while others

;

much

neither possess, nor would very

who

care to possess,

by its and like

a genuine mystical experience are attracted theological background

philosophical and

A

to be accounted mystics.

who

and moralism

of

case in point here

is

from the historicity a narrow evangelical theology and

that of the person

revolts

desires an expression of the Divine activity in cosmic

terms. His natural bent of mind is towards ideas rather than towards " facts," and he will therefore find a

most satisfying system

types of Mysticism.

of

thought

He may have

in

many

but the slightest

sympathy with its devotional aspect, and may even be repelled by the passionately personal element in But he finds the true mystic's approach to God. God and the identified with the view of Mysticism world which corresponds most closely with his own

and so he has no hesitation in confessing himself the disciple of masters whose inmost rnind and spiritual practice he would be the

intellectual affinities,

first

to repudiate.

This

initial

misunderstanding

is

greatly strength-

ened by the new psychological method of treating

most able and attractive Such a method proceeds upon the fundamental unity of

Mysticism which has found

its

English exponent in Miss Evelyn Underhill.

all

mystical experience, Christian or pagan, Eastern

or

Western, and

settings of

altogether

ignores

the

historical

the various periods and great figures of 7

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM Mysticism.

It

introduces us to the

the timeless mystic soul

;

it

movements

of

takes no cognisance of

the raw material of contemporary ideas, hereditary

and ecclesiastical influences upon which that soul worked and which reacted upon prepossessions,

it.

It

therefore tends to obliterate the distinction

between the temporal and accidental and the permanent and essential elements in Mysticism, reducing everything to the same level of timelessness. Of the value of this method, which marks a most important advance in our understanding of Mysticism, it is not necessary to speak at this late day. All its

any and specialised treatment is fast becoming the only possible method of doing justice to the increasing complexity and vastness of every field of knowledge. To-day Mysticism is seen to be a subject of far wider reference and greater complexity than was dreamt of by its earlier interpreters, and to attempt a general treatment combining the historical, theological, and psychological methods within the limits of one volume would be to court failure. But defects are inherent to specialised treatments of

subject,

while specialised interpretations are a necessity, to be regretted that writers

who

it is

take the exclusively

psychological view are not always careful to point

out that their interpretation needs to be supple-

mented by the the beginner

is

historical

method, with the

confronted with needless

and discrepancies.

result that difficulties

Allowing to the utmost for the

deep principle of timeless unity which links the mystics of

all

climes and ages together,

mains that a great

it

still

re-

deal, not only of mystic thought.

^ INTRODUCTORY but also of the form of mystical experience, is determined or coloured by the religious and intellectual conceptions of its day. It follows that an interpretation like the psychological, which is, of necessity, from the historical point of view, an exposition in vacuo, must result in investing its subject with an air of unreality. As a matter of fact, however richly it is illustrated from the lives and sayings of the mystics, and however detailed and accurate its analysis of concrete cases,

it

can, in the last resort,

only introduce us to that indispensable but none the misleading abstraction " the mystic," just as

less

such books as Professor James' Varieties of Religious Experience, in spite of their wealth in genuine human

documents, leave us

in the

end with a useful diagram

or skeleton," the religious temperament," but utterly

and necessarily religious

life.

fail to

It

bring us into touch with the

cannot introduce us to Mysticism

in living interaction

with the general stream of

human

must be remembered that such interaction took place even where the individual mystic was a recluse out of all physical contact with his age. life

;

and

it

Moreover, the mystic, viewed as a psychological abstraction,

us nothing states

;

it

is

not a unity, for psychology can give

more than

a succession of psychological

cannot give the Divine activity

initiating,

and unifying the human. As Dr. Rufus Jones reminds us,^ psychology is as empirical as any other science and possesses no ladder by which it sustaining,

can transcend the empirical order.

It does not,

and

^ spiritual Reformers in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, Introduction, pp. xvi xix.

—

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM in its

very nature cannot, do more than describe

which take place in the soul in response to stimuli which may, or may not, have But that which gives its meaning objective value. certain reactions

to religious experience

is

precisely that transcendent

and objective element concerning which psychology has nothing to say.

My

face," that the soul

when God replies, " Thy is

Psychology merely

seek."

I

It

soul in the act of seeking

;

it

says, " Seek ye face,

presents

can

tell

Lord, will to

us the

us nothing

about the object of her search, nor even whether is an " object " outside of her own self-induced And when psychologists here and there activity.

there

make

the categorical assertion that religious expe-

rience

is

nothing more than the subjective activity of

round its own axis, they are venturing upon a judgment which, as psychologists, they have no right to make. Psychology is a science and to claim for it the of origins, not of validity the

soul

revolving

;

power is,

of deciding

upon the

in the end, to discredit

validity or truth of ideas

it.

II

A

characteristic

psychology,

one who

is

all

instance

of

this

vicious

use

of

the more significant as coming from

confessedly the reverse of a materialist,

is

seen in Professor Leuba's treatment of the relation between theology and psychology. ^ Professor Leuba starts from the assumption that " the gods of religion He then proare inductions from experience." ^ 1

A

Psychological Study of Religion, Chap. Preface, p. viii.

2 Ibid.,

10

XL,

especially pp. 244

—261.

INTRODUCTORY ceeds

to

make an

arbitrary

between

distinction

The former

metaphysical and empirical theology.

he rejects, in a somewhat Ritschlian fashion, as giving us a God-idea which has nothing to do with religion.^

The

latter resolves itself, in his view, into a

made

a hopeless muddle of the problem

person

who can

psychologist, of

grapple with

whom

mere

Theologians have

matter of psychological analysis.

it

is

the only

:

the

scientific

theologians have so craven and

superstitious a fear.

Now when

Dr. Leuba starts from the position that

the gods of religion are inductions from experience,

one need not quarrel with that thesis, provided

understood to mean that the induction experient,

is

made

it

be

by the

and not by the analytic psychologist who atmo-

coolly anatomises the experience in the sterile

sphere of his laboratory. It believer to say, " I know that

is

one thing for the

God

because

exists,

I

have felt Him working in me to comfort, strengthen I know Christ saves, for I called upon and inspire. Him in the hour of temptation and was made strong to tread sin beneath my feet." It is quite another thing to claim that the validity or otherwise of such a conclusion can be established logical

analysis.

The

inward experience of

soul

by psycho-

that has had

God may

utter

its

a

deep,

conviction

Dr. Leuba's criticism of the Ritschlian position is characteristic. He describes the " empirical apologetics " which is the outcome of Ritschlianism as resting upon " two mutually exclusive propositions. On the one hand, it would protect religion against metaphysics by setting up inner experiences the only source of religious knowledge. On the other hand, it as would defend religion against science by invoking the principle of transcendence according to wliich science is incompetent to deal with religious ^

.

.

.

knowledge and

in

Study of Religion^

particular with the question of

p. 244).

II

God

"

{A Psychological

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM with a spiritual authority unchallenged within its own sphere. The psychologist can only make a

pronouncement upon such experience. While one may frankly agree with Dr. Leuba that theology has failed to acknowledge and utilise the indispensable work of the scientific psychologist, that partial

work, valuable as

it

is,

strictly limited in scope.

is

His claim to make religious experience the subject of analysis is fully justified, but not the claim that his is exhaustive he must be content to work hand hand with the metaphysician, the theologian, and

analysis in

:

the historian.

He cannot

usurp their functions with-

out bringing his science into disrepute. After all, we cannot speak of religious experience without asking not only. Of what

of such experience

action

but.

?

is

Of

Whom

found in

its

?

And

the validity

relationship to

upon the whole coherent system

and

of our experi-

which involves metaphysical, theological, hisand other problems outside the scope of psychological analysis. The question is whether a

ence,

torical,

given religious experience unifies our world, is in harmony with universal principles, solves problems

which no other power could solve, and is effective in something more than the crude, pragmatic sense. Psychology can, at its best, only give us one half of a movement in which it is precisely the remaining half which justifies the whole. This is obvious yet such the glamour which the very term " religious is psychology " has for certain minds, that a book like ;

Professor James' Varieties of Religious Experience is hailed as the final justification of religious experience

against

all assaults,

and the complete solution 12

of all

INTRODUCTORY mysteries involved in the soul's contact with the

How

Eternal.

far astray

an exclusively psychologi-

method may lead a most gifted exponent is seen Miss Underhill's ^he Mystic Way, where she

cal in

attempts the tour de force of

experience of

fitting the

Jesus and of Paul into the conventional three-stage

mould

of

classical

with the result

Mysticism,

of

sacrificing all sanity of historical interpretation with-

out gaining even a consistent psychology. It follows,

from

therefore,

all

this,

that a really

adequate study of Mysticism must include researches in

not immediately related to the mystical

fields

experience.

It certainly involves, in the case of the

study of Christian mystics, a knowledge of Church

and

history,

struggles

especially

also, of course, a

;

philosophy and

of

the

of

more

knowledge

the

thought

of

it.

One

half of

that

move-

called Platonism, as

speculative

succeeding ages and, indeed, influence

theological

of the history

especially of

ment which may roughly be influenced

great

may

still

what seems

mystics

it

in

be said to bizarre,

ir-

rational or irrelevant to the average reader of mystical literature will

viewed

in

become luminous and

significant

when

relation to the particular intellectual or

which it was born, and the was designed to react. subsidiary difficulty which meets the student

religious conflict out of

tendency against which

A

on the very threshold limitations

it

arises

out of the inevitable

and idiosyncrasies

of mystical literature.

His introduction to the original sources difficult

—a

by the peculiar language

is

rendered

of the great mystics

language which has no parallel in the religious '3

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM phraseology of to-day.

And when

he turns from the

original sources to the interpreters of Mysticism, he finds that our best writers are entirely steeped in the

language of the great mystics. This

is

natural enough,

but we need not conceal from ourselves that the very thing which seems most real and congenial to

who

is

not familiarised

with mystical phraseology as unreal,

if

not deliberately

the writer impresses the reader

The discerning reader will not for a affected. moment deny that the language and presentation of such interpreters one can only once more instance

—

—

are touched with beauty of an arand keenly poignant type, and have their own spiritual distinction and charm. But their beauty is of a weirdly unfamiliar character, and as the reader gropes his way through phrases consecrated by age-

Miss Underhill resting

long mystic uses, but to

and remote

him dim

as faded tapestry

an old-world fable, he misses all sense of continuity with his own life and experience. There is nothing more curiously powerful than the as

upon the mind, and in eight proposition which would be con-

influence of phraseology

cases out of ten a

couched in the language of the reader's intellectual habitat becomes " sicklied o'er with the vincing

if

pale cast " of artificiality and quasi-esotericism

when

presented in a foreign tongue.

Ill

To

arrive at a satisfactory working definition of

Mysticism

is

not easy, and an acquaintance with

existing definitions will increase, rather than lessen,

INTRODUCTORY One need only glance over

the difficulty.

known

definitions

of

the well-

theologians, philosophers

and

and multiplicity

of a

poets^ to realise the complexity

subject that can produce such a variety of conflicting

impressions upon trained minds. laying

down

it

that Mysticism

is

We

find

Noack

" formless specu-

Coventry Patmore insists that it is the most concrete and definite kind of spiritual apprehension of which man is capable. Goethe leaves us groping in the twilight after he has told us that Mysticism is the scholastic of the heart, the dialectic of the feelings Lasson, on the other hand, accuses it of overvaluing knowledge and reason. Cardinal lation," while

;

Wiseman

extols

stigmatises

it

it

as the science of love

;

Harnack

as rationalism applied to the sphere

above reason. Ewald holds mystical theology to be in consonance with simple evangelical faith the ;

theosophical mystic defines his object as initiation into the

Gnosis,

the

wisdom

Ultramontane writers agree

of Divine

mysteries.

defining

Mysticism

in

as the experience of miraculous, or at least super-

natural,

that such

phenomena phenomena

;

and Protestant writers deny

are essential, or indeed anything

but harmful, to the mystic quest. decreasing

number

with laziness,

woe

A large but steadily

of interpreters charge the mystics

selfishness,

and

indifference to

human

an increasing number, on the contrary, agree with Ewald that " the true mystic never withdraws himself from the business of life no, not even from ;

—

the smallest business." ^ For an extensive and interesting Mysticism, Appendix A.

list

of definitions, see Inge, Christian

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM A group and

Forsyth

of theologians, including Principal

Professor

Oman

Herrmann and

England, and

in

Schlatter

in

Professors

Germany, follow the

Ritschlian school in contending that Mysticism, so

from being the movement of the Christian soul

far

at

its

highest power,

is

essentially alien to Christianity

and must be combated

weakening and vitiating opposed by another group, including Dean Inge, Dr. Gwatkin, the late Canon Moberly, and many young and rising men, who see in Mysticism the central and essential element in Christianity to which theological thought must return. To take one more instance. There are those who agree with Harnack that Mysticism is

They

influence.

are

essentially Catholic,

absurdity

;

as a

sharply

and a Protestant mystic a

logical

while others assert with Dr. Gwatkin

that the basal principle of Mysticism

is

specifically

Protestant.

Such glaring discrepancies

them

obvious

that

a

entirely

the various interpreters.

the idiosyncrasies of is

cannot

definition

of

be accounted for by relegating person

of

explicitly

to It

practical

bent will be inclined to accuse the mystics of idle

dreaming, and a scholar of severely intellectual type will

charge

them with hypertrophy

of

sentiment

but this does not account for the amazing contradictoriness

of

are determined

existing

definitions,

more generally valid explanation characteristic ambiguity of

writers

many

by no such temperamental

many

is

of

which

bias.

A

found in the

of the great mystic

who used loosely terms which the modern scribe

uses with

more

or less scientific exactitude,

i6

and who,

INTRODUCTORY where they possessed scholarly training, employed the language of a philosophy and a psychology unfamiliar to

many

otherwise well-informed interpreters.

But the main explanation lies elsewhere. The contradictions and antinomies that irritate us as we study the existing definitions

with certain excep-

are,

due to the temperamental or intellectual

tions, not

bias of the interpreter, nor are they to be accounted for in

by verbal misunderstandings Mysticism

:

A movement

itself.

they are inherent of the soul

which

and the progressive, the passivity and activity, absorption and independence, surrender and acquisition, must hold within itself the most baffling oppositions, the most obstinate antinomies. Paradox,

unites in itself the timeless

and

static

the

dynamic,

" offence "

passion,

—these

are

" the three " notes

which are most clearly impressed upon the mystic heart. The contradictions of those who essay to define Mysticism are but echoes of more of

Christianity

vital

contradictions

in

the

thing

defined

—contra-

which are not, indeed, outside logic, but which demand a larger logic than mere ratiocinadictions

tion to resolve them. if we lay this conflicting jumble of opinion and adopt as our starting point the rough statement that Mysticism is a direct inward apprehension of the Divine, we do not escape the pressure of inherent antinomies. Immediately certain

Even

aside

questions present themselves. spiritual

or

is

it

instinct

Is a special sense or

necessary for such apprehension,

achieved by means of the normal powers or

faculties of the soul raised to their highest

17

potency

?

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM Is this all,

development

of the spiritual

or confined to an esoteric circle

?

powers open to

What

relation

does mystic apprehension bear to the psychic pheno-

mena

of

Mysticism

?

What

is

the place of the con-

templative and the active elements in the mystic life

?

What

is

the relation of the mystic to the world

of nature, of thought,

To the

and

of social relationships

?

these questions and to others arising therefrom

succeeding

chapters will

attempt

an answer,

keeping in view throughout the meaning and value of

Mysticism for the present day.

16

CHAPTER

II

THE NATURE OF MYSTIC APPREHENSION Within

man is

the soul of the Holy, the wise silence, the universal Beauty,

the Eternal One.

Emerson.

The most dangerous and lasting of all the aberrations of Mysticism arose from yielding to the inordinate desire to establish the fact of some conscious activity other than Reason imparted by God to the elect only. Ric^jAC.

SYNOPSIS Is there a special

hension open to circle

?

I.

A

mystic sense or organ

?

—

Is

mystical appre-

or the peculiar property of an esoteric

all

special mystic sense asserted

by few modern

—The influence Gnosticism and Manichaean dualism —Mediaeval ixiaoXoyia Hugh of Victor—Miss Underhill on something other than reason, and the mystic faculty — the sub-conscious — Critique emotion — to be sought Miss Underhill's position —Mystic apprehension not a special and emotion turned upon their source organ, but reason, passivity mystic apprehension and goal — The place Jacob Boehme on true mystic " silence " —Mysticism not the whole —A " pure " mystic a monstrosity Coventry Patmore on apprehension —Valid and degraded forms of Mysticism. The problem of " " are there two ways God —The cism to versus the — Esotericism and universality appeal mystical literature—The mystic and the common people Tauler, Hilton, Law—A vicious view esotericism —The esoteric principle inherent but misused by quasimystical cults —The true —The not a segregated caste of adepts, but pioneers — Coventry Patmore's portrait writers

of

St.

:

will

Is it

?

in

Is it

?

of

will

of

of

in

religion

is

spiritual

esoteri-

II.

initiate

?

:

ex:)teric disciple

of

in

:

of

in life itself,

initiate

of a saint.

elect

CHAPTER

II

THE NATURE OF MYSTIC APPREHENSION The

question as to whether there

is

a special mystic

sense or organ, and whether this faculty

rudimentary form at

mark

least

—common

is

—

in its

to all or the

an esoteric fraternity, has exercised mystical writers of all races and ages. Speaking peculiar

of

roughly, the philosophical mystics,

who

derived their

metaphysics from Neoplatonism and their theology

from the Greek Fathers, held that in every soul there is a core of that God-likeness which alone can comprehend God, and that spiritual apprehension is therefore the most truly " natural " activity of the

The devotional and practical mystics, on the other hand (but this phrase must not be taken to imply that the philosophical mystics lacked devotion and spiritual passion), being influenced partly by the old Gnostic leaven, partly by the Roman doctrine of a salvation and grace imparted from without, soul.

tended to conceive of a special organ of apprehension other than the

will,

the emotions and the reason, and

imparted or withheld as the occult justice of God In an age when philosophy had fallen into

decreed.

among the religious and psychology in the modern sense was yet unborn, the doctrine of a special mystical faculty was readily accepted by many disrepute

practical mystics as affording a plausible solution of

21

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM such problems as the apparent inability of the mass of

mankind

to assimilate mystical teaching,

seeming violence done to the

human

and the

reason in mystical

experience. I

Few modern

writers are bold

enough to argue

for

the existence of a separate mystic sense, different in

kind from those faculties of the soul which the mystic shares

with

position

is

the

humanity.

Such a pro-

by most writers

as a mediaeval

moment

bear the test of

of

rest

rejected

survival which cannot for a

either psychology or metaphysics.

to Gnosticism at

three classes

It takes us

worst, to a division of

its

—mere

men

back into

animals, initiates of the secret

wisdom, and that unfortunate middle class which can neither attain to adeptship nor wallow contentedly It marks a retroin the slough of material things. gression to that Manichaean dualism which has haunte 1 Christian thought from age to age, and is the peculiar snare of those who approach Mysticism without an adequate study of the influences that

Such students are constantly betrayed into an attempt to graft unrecognised Gnostic and Manichaean elements on to their own essentially modern monistic view of the helped to give

it its

traditional forms.

universe, with the result of presenting a piebald inter-

pretation shot through with an element of pseudo-

occultism which puts sensible persons on their guard.

Mystics

who assume

invariably oppose

it

by them not merely

a special mystic sense almost

which is understood the narrow sense of the dis-

to reason, in

22

NATURE OF MYSTIC APPREHENSION cursive understanding, but as including the whole

Thus Hugh St. Victor tells us that when the soul is immersed contemplation of the Absolute " the Reason of the

intellectual

of in

and perceptive

side of

life.

soul sleeps, because, ignorant of the cause of such

happiness,

it is

not capable of conceiving

its origin,

But

present reahty,

and

its

implies, per contra,

that

when reason wakes

its

it

purpose."

^

this

again,

either flatly denies the reality of the soul's mystic

vision, or else

is

completely unaware of

In either

it.

case a dualism has been introduced which would

mystic

an

apprehension

alienation

the

in

make

patho-

logical sense of that word.

A

most interesting discussion

mystic apprehension hill.2

Her

position

is is

of

the

nature of

contributed by Miss Under-

not altogether clear, and her

statement self-contradictory in places

;

but as an

attempt to re-state the old doctrine of a special mystic sense in terms of modern psychology it is of considerable significance.

Miss Underhiil clearly

postulates a special mystical faculty, which she proceeds to relate to the ordinary or " normal " faculties

In her view, the special mystic sense " differs from and transcends the emotional, intellectual and volitional life of ordinary men " ^ but of the soul.

;

must not be taken

this

to

imply that

it is

opposed to

or separated from that life. On the contrary, it " has attachments at each point to the emotion, the intellect and the will " and " can express itself ^

2 3

De Contemplatione et ejus Speciebus [trans. Haureau], Mysticism^ pp. 58-69. Ibid., p. 59.

23

p. 140,

ME.\NIXG -\ND \'ALUE OF MYSTICISM under

each

coanote.*'

The

oi

the

asrects

which

these

terms

^

intentioii here is clearly to escape

from the

impossible irrationalism and dualism of medizeval

an expression as its suggestion of an external addition to the ordinary- faculties, and a using of them

M)-sticism, but the choice of such

" attachments,*' with

man

as a

uses tools,

It belongs to the

unfortunate.

is

conception of things which in the realm of religion

has

made Divine

grace and inspiration to consist in

the introduction from the

**

outside " of a power

fundamentally different from the soul that receives it. To preach such a doctrine from the pulpit to-day

would be a reversion to a superseded view

Why,

the world.

then, introduce terms

of

God and

sufficiently

ambiguous to suggest such a view into a discussion M\-sticism

If m\-stic

?

apprehension

is

of

an\thing but

must conform to the criterion of identit\" which we apply to aU " supernatural " facts. It must be continuous with the " emotion, the intellect and the will, not " attaching a pathological s}"mptom,

it

a.- d. as it were, expressing itself through them, as tie Dszion was supposed to expr^s himself throng T-.e Tr.--:e£ rrophet, but augmenting them from "..:..;.::i.-^ : he same to the same." It is not for a 2i:~tz: sur^t :ei :ha: Miss UnderhiU

itself to tiiezi

".

intends an\-diiiig so ez: j:i.h terz:

3.zz-zr.~z-~ "

*'

- = :::;-

:r:~

::

:

i^

that

rat:;-al

"

—

r 1 : : _.

r

—

"

'

but her use of the

quotation in this con-

Another a'i

intellect, different

denominated is an opposition rather than a vital

-which i-iiply

h.er

r.::

.

=5 this,

:;:.f:i5

*

Mj«»cu«,

24

p. 59.

NATURE OF MYSTIC APPREHENSION connection ber.veen the "vstic s^nse and reason.

In

a passage which seems to represent her £nai -osition she contends that " since normal man, by means of his

feeling,

set

up

thought and

will, is

utterly unable to

relations with spiritual Reality, it

—

clearly

is

unplumbed levels of personality" that we must search if we would find the organ, the power, by which he is to achieve ~Sz.t m^-stic quest. .i -. That alteration of consc: : isnt?

in the

depth of being

—

^in

these

5

~r = '

takes place in contemplation can only

emergence from of

some

facult\'

:

zz.t

this fund or bottom of tie soul which diurnal life ketrs jiiiien in

In what follows she aiziiTs tJi^T zsl^z power or organ is present in its r:.i:7.\t-z3.ry fom. azi. more or less deeply hidden, witr. v.zz. but that in the deeps."

^

:-.'.'.

the mystics, those the silent, hidden

*"

'"

naniral exrl::r:;

Dv^tlt:

Iz.

z'zzt

:: :>-e

Infinite,"

Izzermc^t " be-

comes active and arnculate. There is a '" putting to sleep of that norir :! 5r".: which usually wakes and the awakening of that Transcendent Self which usually sleeps.*' It is, in fa::. " a re-makiiig of the whole personality' in the interests of one bit or spot of man which, belongs not to Time but to Etemit%*.'' * All this does not tell us anything ver^- definite about tne precise nature of that sre^cial mystic sense which is to be found hidden in the derihs of the personalit)" the sense which Miss Und .ems to identif)* at times with the whole spiriiuajL self, the hidden man of the heart. On two points she is cuite *

—

:

^ MjstidswL, p. 61. • /W., p. 67. 05.

25

..

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM The hidden faculty must not be identified with that very mixed and muddy quantity, the subconscious and its action upon will, feeling and intellect is positive, enhancing and not paralysing their activity. The mystics, she says, " have roused the clear.

;

Dweller in the

Innermost

round

unified

have

it

will are there

in

from

their

action,

full

its

life.

slumbers and Heart,

reason,

drawing their energy,

not from the shadow-show of sense, but from the deeps of true Being consciousness

remains

where a lamp is lit and a which the sleepy crowd Here she stands in whole-

;

awake

oblivious."

some contradiction

of

^

to the negative conception of the

mystic faculty as held by the Victorines,

St.

ventura, St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa and others,

who

think of

It

normal powers language

special mystical sense for

and

silencing

and putting to

of the soul.

would, indeed, appear from the tenor of Miss

Underhill's

is

many

action as a process of empty-

its

ing and stripping bare sleep the

Bona-

God.

But

that is

what she means by a

really

man's susceptibility

in that case her choice of language

particularly unfortunate, for the soul's suscepti-

bility

for

God cannot be

legitimately

symbolised

by such spatial figures as " a bit or spot of man." Nor can it be described as an occult faculty which moves and inspires heart, reason, and will. It is in reality

nothing else than the intellectual, volitional

and emotional powers turned upon their source and goal. So far from the " normal " man being " utterly unable to set up relations with spiritual ^

Mysticism,

26

p. 75.

NATURE OF MYSTIC APPREHENSION by means

and will," by which man is intended to make contact with God and wherever they correspond merely to the " natural " world, we have a condition which, so far from being normal, is, in the reality

of his feeling, thought

these three are the organs

;

deepest sense, abnormal.

It is at this point that a

return to the root-principles which gave to early

Greek theology its enlarging and energising power will save Mysticism from an essentially narrowing dualistic conception. The early Greek Fathers taught that man's susceptibility for God is not something other than " normal," but that it is the natural craving of a spirit constituted for God and inalienably affiliated with the Divine. It is not something moving the reason, directing the

on

will,

setting the emotions

fire it is reason, will and feeling exercising their most truly natural function the whole personality of man in contact with its Source and End, We are accustomed to say, in common religious parlance, :

—

that

man

has a deep hunger for God, and the phrase

suggests a special capacity which cries out to find its

fulfilment in God.

by

it

?

Is it

But what do we

the heart of God, that man's of

the Eternal

anchorage in the

three

mind aches

mean home in

really

not that man's heart cries for a

for the light

Reason, that man's will gropes for the

faculties

Divine will

may

ment towards God,

?

One

or

other of

be primary in the move-

according

to

the

individual

temperament, or all three may have an equal share in it. But whichever be predominant, man's hunger for God cannot, without violating all good sense,

be described as a special spiritual organ or

27

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM In the case of the mystic that suscepti-

capacity.

bihty for

God which

average soul reaches

apprehension

real

more

is

—a

and neglected in the development and becomes

latent

its full

vital

perception

of

Reality

and convincing than the testimony of the senses. As Miss Underhill rightly says, " Just as genius in any of the arts is, humanly speaking, the final term of a power of which each individual posclear

sesses

the rudiments, so Mysticism

may

be looked

upon as the final term, the active expression of a power latent in the whole race." ^ But here it may be objected that a conception of the mystic faculty which identifies it with emotion, intellect and will raised to their highest potency and exercising their most truly " natural " function contradicts not only the theory, but the experience of all the great master-mystics,

who

invariably found

that the Eternal can only be experienced in a pro-

found and brooding silence extending even to thought

and

desire.

Nothing, indeed,

is

more common

in

mystical experience than the vision and transfigura-

come to the soul within the dark "cloud unknowing," the mysterious spiritual potency and fertility which are the outcome of deep, interior quiet. How then can we say that mystic apprehension is reason and feeling and will in supreme action ? A passage from Jacob Boehme on true quiet of soul " Cease but suggests the answer to such a question from thine own activity, steadfastly fixing thine eye upon one point. For this end, gather in all thy thoughts and by faith press into the Centre, tion that of

:

^

Mysticism, p. 87.

28

NATURE OF MYSTIC APPREHENSION Word of God, which is infallible and which hath called thee. Be thou obedient to this call, and be silent before the Lord sitting alone with Him in thy inmost and most hidden cell, thy mind being centrally united in itself and attending His will in the patience of hope. So shall thy light break ^ forth as the morning." Here the two elements which make up true silence of the soul are clearly set forth. There is attention the capacity for steady and laying hold upon the

—

sustained

insight

into

reality

—and

there

is

the

active co-operation of the obedient spirit. Boehme's " silence before the Lord " is not that sleep of the

Hugh of St. Victor extols, for the sleeping reason cannot " gather in all its thoughts." It is rather the wise " passiveness " of Wordsworth reason which

by which the soul is nourished. It is reason (by which is meant not the discursive understanding to which Boehme rightly denies spiritual vision, but " the whole logic of the personality ") in that state of pure receptiveness and purged passivity which is

an act involving all the energies of the soul. Reasoning and speculation are indeed suspended, but only for the sake of those " good thoughts " which

in itself

are " the free children of

God and do not come by

thinking." Such activity of the soul may be described as an " alienation," but not in the sense of a drugging or hypnotisation of the faculties

:

it

is

reason, will

and emotion alienated from their preoccupation with the ephemeral, and naturahsed to their high original uses. It

should be remembered here that ^

Dialogues of the Supersensual Life, p. 56.

29

it

is

quite

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM monopoly

to claim a

illegitimate

the spiritual

of

instinct for Mysticism, as Miss Underbill appears to

The mystical

do.

is

only one element in religion, and

while every true Christian the spiritual

whose main bent

is,

comes to

self

to

its

some extent, a mystic, in temperaments

own

not in the direction of Mysticism.

is

Communion with God,

spiritual inwardness, inspired

insight into Reality, are not confined to mystics

must owed of

it

;

nor

be forgotten that the greatest mystics have

and stability to the admixture whether rational, evangelical

force

their

elements,

other

or institutional, in their

" pure " mystic madhouse.

spiritual constitution.

A

indeed, unthinkable outside the

is,

For a description of mystical apprehension which, however partial and defective, has the merit of being untechnical and modern in feeling

we may turn

to

Coventry Patmore. His terminology differs somewhat widely from that of the present-day psychological interpreter of Mysticism, and he takes his start from that form and degree of real apprehension which is " emphatically the quality which constitutes

good sense."

"

To

see rightly

is

the

first

of

human

and right action are normally There are two ways of seeing its one is to comprehend, which is to see all round a thing and to embrace it one is to apprehend, which qualities

;

right feeling

consequence.

:

;

is

to see

it

in part or to take hold

of

it.

A

thing

may be really taken hold of which is much too big You cannot read the writings of for embracing.! and St. Augustine without Pascal Hooker, Newman, ^

^

^

^

Religio Poetce^ p. 282.

30

NATURE OF MYSTIC APPREHENSION being strongly impressed with the presumption that

they have a real apprehension of the things they and, since they do not justify any other way the theory that they are lunatics, a right-minded reader is disposed to think that what they have thus seen exists, and that his not having profess to believe

;

in

seen such things need not materially diminish that probability. 1

.

.

.

Genius

is

nothing but great good

upon objects out of common sight, and the chief ingredient of even the highest and most heroic sanctity is the same apprehension taking hold upon spiritual truths and applying them to the conduct of sense or real apprehension

more or

exercised

less

the interior as well as the exterior

" The intellect

is

can

properly

.

.

.^

the faculty of the seer.

cerns truth as a living thing

that

life.

be

.

.

called

.

It dis-

without anything

ratiocination.

.

.

.

Although this faculty of direct vision is very rare in comparison with those of ordinary ratiocination and

memory,

it is

For one seer

not nearly so rare as

who

has

the

is

supposed.

.

.

.

accomplishments and

opportunities whereby his faculty can be turned to public account, there are scores and hundreds

who

possess and exercise for their private use their extra-

ordinary perceptive powers.

To whom has

it

not

happened, at one time or other, to witness the instantaneous shattering of some splendid edifice of reasoning

and memory by the brief, Socratic interrogation some ignoramus who could see ? " ^ ^

Religio Poetts, p. 285. 284.

^ Ibid., p. ^

Ibid., pp. 291-292.

31

of

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM Fragmentary and this

account

is,

purely suggestive value as

of

emphasises an important point

it

the continuity of spiritual with ordinary apprehen-

The implication

sion.

is

not, of course, that every

person of good sense could exercise mystical apprehension

if

only he

felt

mystical apprehension

so inclined,

but that the

the highest rung of a ladder

is

which reaches from common sense to ecstasy.

We

are

then, with a conception of mystical

left,

apprehension which makes consciousness, another qualities of the self " ^ for

bility

God

as

'

;

it

not " another sort of

beyond the normal but man's native suscepti-

sense

'

the controlling principle of

his

—that steeping

of mind, heart and which is not the mere beholding of a Divine Image, " with open face," but the being " transformed into that same Image from glory unto glory." It is the Seeing of which all

whole personality

what

is

vital

other seeing

is

but a shadowy type

will in

Bread

Heaven

and

eternal,

that eating of the

;

which all Eucharistic celebrations While realised fully and explicitly by comparatively few, it is, in some degree, the property of all truly spiritual beings and the number of inarticulate mystics who have neither the gift of of

of

are only a pale copy.

;

expressing their experience, nor the art of recognising it

for

all, it

what it is, is far larger than we imagine. Above must be kept in mind that any so-called mystical

experience which

is

the result of putting the reason to

any deliberately cultivated psychic process, is a degraded form of Mysticism. However often such methods may have

sleep,

of self-hypnotisation,

^

or of

E. Underhill, Mysticism^ p. 59.

32

NATURE OF MYSTIC APPREHENSION been employed insight

and

in good faith by mystics of the

most valid

of the highest ethical character, they must,

an occultism which has nothing in common with the high moral and spiritual energies of the soul that seeks the living God. in themselves, be regarded as belonging to

II

We

have seen that the mystic faculty is not a development of what is rudimentary in all. The point before us now is whether this development is open to all, or whether the relation special organ, but the

of mystics to non-mystics

is

to exoteric discipleship.

And

in

mind that an

be a small one.

that of esoteric initiation

here

esoteric circle

We may

it

must be borne

need not necessarily

grant quite readily that

while the great master-mystics are few, the of those

who

of expressing is

far larger

the circle

is

number

share the mystic gift without the power it,

or even of recognising

it

than we think, and yet we closed

—that

not

all

men

in themselves,

may

hold that

are capable of

reaching the point of development at which their instinctive sense of

The question

passes into vital perception.

one that has agitated Christian

is

On

the one hand, we have those interpret the mystic " way " as a specialised

opinion in

who

God

all ages.

form of the search for Reality to which oniy the " elect " are called on the other, there are very many ;

who oppose Christianity.

this doctrine

as alien to the spirit of

For the Christian, they say, there

is

but one road to God, and the wayfaring man, though a

fool,

spiritual

cannot

err

receptivity,

therein.

a

Honesty,

simplicity,

humble and loving 33

heart,

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM these are the only conditions of initiation into a

which to

way

equally open to John the farm labourer and

is

Between these two views the A healthy instinct makes

John the Divine.

inquirer stands perplexed.

him

from the idea of a special order of initiates, most objectionable form of spiritual priggishness and to end in a debased occultism. But over against that he has recoil

with

inevitable tendency to breed the

its

intimate personal knowledge of actually live on loftier

planes

and activity than

fellows

their

men and women who of

spiritual

—whose

life,

insight

indeed,

suggests a difference not merely in degree, but in

kind

;

with.

and such Moreover,

facts are stubborn things to quarrel

the

Bibles

of

all

are

religions

standing witnesses to the fact that special intuitions of truth

and grace are given

every aspiring

spirit

moments upon

to elect souls.

Nay,

has stood for brief but indelible

the confines

of

a

new

world, has

touched heights he was not competent to keep, has felt in

one passing flash of direct intuition that

all

him that believeth. Such made him turn wistful eyes to the Mystic Way, only to be repelled once more by its sharply defined stages, its unfamiliar mechanism above all, by its hateful and its archaic trappings

things were possible to

meteoric illuminations have

;

suggestion of esotericism.

When we

turn to mystical literature the same oppo-

sition confronts us.

We

are

made

conscious both of

and intimate esotericism and of a broad and what is most truly and deeply human in man. Its esotericism is not the provincial temper of the sect, the secret society, the coterie of a strict

far-reaching appeal to

34

NATURE OF MYSTIC APPREHENSION adepts

;

it is

the august secrecy of the Holy Assembly

— that interior Church gathered together from every age and nation, in which a humble shoemaker the chief hierophant of mysteries and the

take place

among

the doctors.

may

little

Hence we

be

child

are not

surprised to find that the most influential parts of

mystical literature are not those which have gone to

produce sects and

societies,

but rather those which

speak most plainly to the universal

Such

literature does not

leths

of

any " school "

busy of

itself

human

with the shibbo-

mystical doctrine, but

opens up that philosophia -perennis v/hich

theosophy that

is

intellectual fashions

heart.

is

the only

not at the mercy of changing

and

is

approved by the pure and

aspiring heart everywhere.

While the vision of the mystics is " so interwoven into the very fibre of his inmost being that it refuses to be detached and offered to others God ever as material for mental assimilation," ^ comes to the true mystic seer, not merely as He who has called him by name, but as " the light which

man

lighteth every

Knowing God

that cometh into the world."

ground of his own being, ground of every and so, while he must ever say, " My man's being secret unto myself," he is also pledged to an aposFor him there can be no tolate among men. profanum vulgus such paganism is entirely abhorrent For him there is no such thing to the mystic genius. as an " exoteric " crowd. At all times and in all as the hidden

he also knows

Him

as the hidden

;

—

places he

is ^

W.

conscious of addressing himself to the F.

Cobb, Mysticism and

35

the Creed, p. 37.

MEANING AND VALUE OF MYSTICISM Divine witness in the heart, to the unknown Christ in

man.

While, therefore, duly on his guard against

the casting of pearls before swine, no timid scruples lest he profane the mysteries will keep him aloof from the common people, nor will a vicious dignity blind him to his kinship with his fellows. Among

Christian mystics, at

any

rate,

we

find little affec-

tation of esotericism such as the uninformed critic

often assumes, but, on the contrary, a simple-hearted willingness to impart of their treasure to

the

who ask

and, not infrequently, the passion of

in sincerity,

preacher

Mysticism

all

to

—

or

Thus Tauler preached

prophet.

crowded

congregations of average to those who " made shoes by the

church-goers Spirit " as well as to those

Holy

who wrote

books.

Walter Hilton, that most humble and sweet-spoken of English mystics, wrote for such as had not even a working acquaintance with every-day religious language. In the writings of William Law it is the simple Rusticus, innocent even of the art of reading,

loves Jacob

Boehme and apprehends

who

mysteries which

are the despair of the learned Academicus.

Ruys-

broeck, most daringly speculative

and

Catholic mystics, was

the most easily

also one

of

esoteric

of

open up the way most ignorant and unpromising of inquirers. And the instinct which prompts the mystic to stand before a group or a crowd and make appeal, not

accessible of teachers, ever ready to

to the

to the crowd-spirit, but to

Him who

ever goes in

advance of His messengers and who speaks heart of the hearers before

He

in the

speaks in the voice of

the preacher, has been amply justified by results.

36

NATURE OF MYSTIC APPREHENSION In the most unlikely quarters souls have responded to the mystic witness. There is no " church " so uni-

innumerable company of unknown mystics throughout the world. Not

versal, so representative, as the

only

the

restless

and

unconventional,

the

Magnum,

adventurers in search of the Mysterium

answer to the mystic message

;

in

wild

every humble

work-a-day Christian congregation there are those who live by mystic apprehension. The discerning traveller marvels again and again at the large number of poor unlettered sides,

folk,

who have deep

often in remote country-

kinship with the great mystics,

by an infallible instinct, understand what they have never been taught in so many words, holding in toil-worn hands the key to realms of spiritual truth whose gates are barred to the deliberate " I have heard," frequenter of mystic societies. " some of our savages,' says Coventry Patmore, Sions' and haunters of little 'Bethels,' Carmels,' use the obscurest imagery of Scripture with an evident grasp of its significance which many a Bishop might have envied." ^ The fact is that our conception of the mystic life is determined by an We have entirely false and mischievous convention. become obsessed by a doctrine of mystic esotericism which the great mystics would have repudiated in wrath. Everything they have written concerning and,

'

'

'

the severe secrecy of the mystic quest has been externalised of

by

us, until

we have imported

Mysticism the atmosphere of the

into our study

shilling seance^ the

"New Thought" centre, and the average Masonic lodge.