Mysticism in English Literature | Page 5

the end of things, that all nature is
leading up to union with the One.
We shall find that mystical thought, and the mystical attitude, are
curiously persistent in English literature, and that although it seems out
of keeping with our "John Bull" character, the English race has a
marked tendency towards mysticism. What we do find lacking in
England is the purely philosophical and speculative spirit of the
detached and unprejudiced seeker after truth. The English mind is
anti-speculative; it cares little for metaphysics; it prefers theology and a
given authority. English mystics have, as a rule, dealt little with the
theoretical side of mysticism, the aspect for instance with which
Plotinus largely deals. They have been mainly practical mystics, such
as William Law. Those of the poets who have consciously had a system
and desired to impart it, have done so from the practical point of view,
urging, like Wordsworth, the importance of contemplation and
meditation, or, like Blake, the value of cultivating the imagination; and
in both cases enforcing the necessity of cleansing the inner life, if we
are to become conscious of our divine nature and our great heritage.
For the sake of clearness, this thought may first be traced very briefly
as it appears chronologically; it will, however, be considered in detail,
not in order of time, but according to the special aspect of Being
through which the writer felt most in touch with the divine life. For
mystics, unlike other thinkers, scientific or philosophical, have little
chronological development, since "mystic truths can neither age nor
die." So much is this the case that passages of Plotinus and Tennyson,
of Boehme and Law, of Eckhart and Browning, may be placed side by
side and be scarcely distinguishable in thought. Yet as the race evolves,
certain avenues of sensation seem to become more widely opened up.
This is noticeable with regard to Nature. Love, Beauty, Wisdom, and
Devotion, these have been well-trodden paths to the One ever since the
days of Plato and Plotinus; but, with the great exception of St Francis
of Assisi and his immediate followers, we have to wait for more
modern times before we find the intense feeling of the Divinity in
Nature which we associate with the name of Wordsworth. It is in the

emphasis of this aspect of the mystic vision that English writers are
supreme. Henry Vaughan, Wordsworth, Browning, Richard Jefferies,
Francis Thompson, and a host of other poet-seers have crystallised in
immortal words this illuminated vision of the world.
The thought which has been described as mystical has its roots in the
East, in the great Oriental religions. The mysterious "secret" taught by
the Upanishads is that the soul or spiritual consciousness is the only
source of true knowledge. The Hindu calls the soul the "seer" or the
"knower," and thinks of it as a great eye in the centre of his being,
which, if he concentrates his attention upon it, is able to look outwards
and to gaze upon Reality. The soul is capable of this because in essence
it is one with Brahman, the universal soul. The apparent separation is
an illusion wrought by matter. Hence, to the Hindu, matter is an
obstruction and a deception, and the Eastern mystic despises and rejects
and subdues all that is material, and bends all his faculties on realising
his spiritual consciousness, and dwelling in that.
This type of thought certainly existed to some extent in both Greece
and Egypt before the Christian era. Much of Plato's thought is mystical
in essence, and that which be points out to be the motive force of the
philosophic mind is also the motive force of the mystic, namely, the
element of attraction, and so of love towards the thing which is akin to
him. The illustration of the dog being philosophic because he is angry
with a stranger but welcomes his friend,[3] though at first it may seem,
like many of Plato's illustrations, far-fetched or fanciful, in truth goes to
the very root of his idea. Familiarity, akinness, is the basis of attraction
and affection. The desire of wisdom, or the love of beauty, is therefore
nothing but the yearning of the soul to join itself to what is akin to it.
This is the leading conception of the two great mystical dialogues, the
Symposium and the Phædrus. In the former, Socrates, in the words of
the stranger prophetess Diotima, traces the path along which the soul
must travel, and points out the steps of the ladder to be climbed in order
to attain to union with the Divine. From beauty of form and body we
rise to beauty of mind and spirit, and so to the Beauty of God Himself.
He who under the influence of true love rising upward from