Practical Mysticism | Page 5

four exhibit different forms
of the working of the contemplative consciousness; a faculty which is
proper to all men, though few take the trouble to develop it. Their
attention to life has changed its character, sharpened its focus: and as a
result they see, some a wider landscape, some a more brilliant, more
significant, more detailed world than that which is apparent to the less
educated, less observant vision of common sense. The old story of Eyes
and No-Eyes is really the story of the mystical and unmystical types.
"No-Eyes" has fixed his attention on the fact that he is obliged to take a
walk. For him the chief factor of existence is his own movement along
the road; a movement which he intends to accomplish as efficiently and
comfortably as he can. He asks not to know what may be on either side
of the hedges. He ignores the caress of the wind until it threatens to
remove his hat. He trudges along, steadily, diligently; avoiding the
muddy pools, but oblivious of the light which they reflect. "Eyes" takes
the walk too: and for him it is a perpetual revelation of beauty and
wonder. The sunlight inebriates him, the winds delight him, the very
effort of the journey is a joy. Magic presences throng the roadside, or
cry salutations to him from the hidden fields. The rich world through
which he moves lies in the fore-ground of his consciousness; and it
gives up new secrets to him at every step. "No-Eyes," when told of his
adventures, usually refuses to believe that both have gone by the same
road. He fancies that his companion has been floating about in the air,
or beset by agreeable hallucinations. We shall never persuade him to
the contrary unless we persuade him to look for himself.
Therefore it is to a practical mysticism that the practical man is here

invited: to a training of his latent faculties, a bracing and brightening of
his languid consciousness, an emancipation from the fetters of
appearance, a turning of his attention to new levels of the world. Thus
he may become aware of the universe which the spiritual artist is
always trying to disclose to the race. This amount of mystical
perception--this "ordinary contemplation," as the specialists call it--is
possible to all men: without it, they are not wholly conscious, nor
wholly alive. It is a natural human activity, no more involving the great
powers and sublime experiences of the mystical saints and philosophers
than the ordinary enjoyment of music involves the special creative
powers of the great musician.
As the beautiful does not exist for the artist and poet alone-- though
these can find in it more poignant depths of meaning than other
men--so the world of Reality exists for all; and all may participate in it,
unite with it, according to their measure and to the strength and purity
of their desire. "For heaven ghostly," says The Cloud of Unknowing, "is
as nigh down as up, and up as down; behind as before, before as behind,
on one side as other. Inasmuch, that whoso had a true desire for to be at
heaven, then that same time he were in heaven ghostly. For the high
and the next way thither is run by desires, and not by paces of feet."
None therefore is condemned, save by his own pride, sloth, or
perversity, to the horrors of that which Blake called "single
vision"--perpetual and undivided attention to the continuous
cinematograph performance, which the mind has conspired with the
senses to interpose between ourselves and the living world.
CHAPTER II
THE WORLD OF REALITY
The practical man may justly observe at this point that the world of
single vision is the only world he knows: that it appears to him to be
real, solid, and self-consistent: and that until the existence-- at least, the
probability--of other planes of reality is made clear to him, all talk of
uniting with them is mere moonshine, which confirms his opinion of
mysticism as a game fit only for idle women and inferior poets. Plainly,

then, it is the first business of the missionary to create, if he can, some
feeling of dissatisfaction with the world within which the practical man
has always lived and acted; to suggest something of its fragmentary and
subjective character. We turn back therefore to a further examination of
the truism--so obvious to those who are philosophers, so exasperating
to those who are not--that man dwells, under normal conditions, in a
world of imagination rather than a world of facts; that the universe in
which he lives and at which he looks is but a construction which the
mind has made from some few amongst the wealth of materials at its
disposal.
The relation of this universe to the