Mysticism in English Literature Part 7

to know ourselves Parts and proportions of one wonderous whole!

The way to attain this knowledge is not by a process of reasoning, but by a definite act of will, when the "drowsed soul" begins to feel dim recollections of its n.o.bler nature, and so gradually becomes attracted and absorbed to perfect love--

and centered there G.o.d only to behold, and know, and feel, Till by exclusive consciousness of G.o.d All self-annihilated it shall make G.o.d its Ident.i.ty: G.o.d all in all!

This sense of "oneness," with the desire to reach out to it, was very strong with Coleridge in these earlier years, and he writes to Thelwall in 1797, "The universe itself, what but an immense heap of little things?... My mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something _great_, something _one_ and _indivisible_." He is ever conscious of the symbolic quality of all things by which we are visibly surrounded,

all that meets the bodily sense I deem Symbolical, one mighty alphabet For infant minds.[48]

To pierce through the outer covering, and realise the truth which they embody, it is necessary to feel as well as to see, and it is the loss of this power of feeling which Coleridge deplores in those bitterly sad lines in the _Dejection Ode_ when he gazes "with how blank an eye" at the starry heavens, and cries,

I see, not feel, how beautiful they are!

It is in this Ode that we find the most complete description in English verse of that particular state of depression and stagnation which often follows on great exaltation, and to which the religious mystics have given the name of the "dark night of the soul." This is an experience, not common to all mystics, but very marked in some, who, like St John of the Cross and Madame Guyon, are intensely devotional and ecstatic. It seems to be a well-defined condition of listlessness, apathy, and _dryness_, as they call it, not a state of active pain, but of terrible inertia, weariness, and incapacity for feeling; "a wan and heartless mood," says Coleridge,

A grief without a pang, void, dark, and drear, A stifled, drowsy, unimpa.s.sioned grief, Which finds no natural outlet, no relief, In word, or sigh, or tear.

Coleridge's distrust of the intellect as sole guide, and his belief in some kind of intuitional act being necessary to the apprehension of reality, which he felt as early as 1794, was strengthened by his study of the German transcendental philosophers, and in March 1801 he writes, "My opinion is that deep thinking is attainable only by a man of deep feeling; and that all truth is a species of Revelation."

Coleridge, following Kant, gave the somewhat misleading name of "reason"

(as opposed to "understanding") to the intuitive power by which man apprehends G.o.d directly, and, in his view, imagination is the faculty, which in the light of this intuitive reason interprets and unifies the symbols of the natural world. Hence its value, for it alone gives man the key

Of that eternal language, which thy G.o.d Utters, who from eternity doth teach Himself in all, and all things in himself.[49]

Carlyle's mysticism is the essence of his being, it flames through his amazing medley of writings, it guides his studies and his choice of subjects, it unifies and explains his visions, his thought, and his doctrines. His is a mystical att.i.tude and belief of a perfectly simple and broad kind, including no abstruse subtleties of metaphysical speculation, as with Coleridge, but based on one or two deeply rooted convictions. This position seems to have been reached by him partly through intellectual conflict which found relief and satisfaction in the view of life taken by Goethe, Fichte, and other German "transcendental"

thinkers; but partly also through a definite psychical experience which befell him in Edinburgh when he was twenty-six, and which from that day changed for him the whole of his outlook on life. He speaks of it himself as "a Spiritual New-birth, or Baphometic Fire-baptism." It came to him after a period of great wretchedness, of torture with doubt and despair, and--what is significant--"during three weeks of total sleeplessness." These are conditions which would be likely to reduce his body to the state of weakness and sensitiveness which seems often antecedent to psychic experience. He has given an account of the incident in _Sartor_ (Book ii. chap, vii.), when, he says, "there rushed like a stream of fire over my whole soul; and I shook base Fear away from me for ever. I was strong, of unknown strength; a spirit, almost a G.o.d." The revelation seems to have been of the nature of a certainty and a.s.sertion of his own inherent divinity, his "native G.o.d-created majesty," freedom and potential greatness. This brought with it a characteristic defiance of untoward outer circ.u.mstances which gave him strength and resolution. "Perhaps," he says, "I directly thereupon began to be a man."

Carlyle believes that the world and everything in it is the expression of one great indivisible Force; that nothing is separate, nothing is dead or lost, but that all "is borne forward on the bottomless sh.o.r.eless flood of Action, and lives through perpetual metamorphoses." Everything in the world is an embodiment of this great Force, this "Divine Idea,"

hence everything is important and charged with meaning. "Rightly viewed no meanest object is insignificant; all objects are as windows, through which the philosophic eye looks into Infinitude itself."[50]

The universe is thus the "living visible garment of G.o.d," and "matter exists only spiritually," "to represent some Idea, and _body_ it forth."

We, each of us, are therefore one expression of this central spirit, the only abiding Reality; and so, in turn, everything we know and see is but an envelope or clothing encasing something more vital which is invisible within. Just as books are the most miraculous things men can make, because a book "is the _purest_ embodiment a Thought of man can have,"

so great men are the highest embodiment of Divine Thought visible to us here. Great men are, as it were, separate phrases, "inspired texts" of the great book of revelation, perpetually interpreting and unfolding in various ways the G.o.dlike to man (_Hero as Man of Letters_, and _Sartor_, Book ii. chap. viii.).

From this ground-belief spring all Carlyle's views and aims. Hence his gospel of hero-wors.h.i.+p, for the "hero" is the greatest embodied "Idea" a man can know, he is a "living light fountain," he is "a man sent hither to make the divine mystery more impressively known to us." Hence it is clear that the first condition of the great man is that he should be sincere, that he should _believe_. "The merit of originality is not novelty: it is sincerity. The believing man is the original man." It is equally necessary that his admirers should be sincere, they too must believe, and not only, as Coleridge puts it, "believe that they believe." No more immoral act can be done by a human creature, says Carlyle, than to pretend to believe and wors.h.i.+p when he does not.

Hence also springs Carlyle's doctrine of work. If man is but the material embodiment of a spiritual Idea or Force, then his clear duty is to express that Force within him to the utmost of his power. It is what he is here for, and only so can he bring help and light to his fellow-men.[51] And Carlyle, with Browning, believes that it is not the actual deeds accomplished that matter, no man may judge of these, for "man is the spirit he worked in; not what he did, but what he became."

Chapter V

Devotional and Religious Mystics

All mystics are devotional and all are religious in the truest sense of the terms. Yet it seems legitimate to group under this special heading those writers whose views are expressed largely in the language of the Christian religion, as is the case with our earliest mystics, with Crashaw and Francis Thompson and it applies in some measure to Blake.

But beyond this, it seems, in more general terms, to apply specially to those who are so conscious of G.o.d that they seem to live in His presence, and who are chiefly concerned with approaching Him, not by way of Love, Beauty, Wisdom, or Nature, but directly, through purgation and adoration.

This description, it is obvious, though it fits fairly well the other writers here included, by no means suffices for Blake. For he possessed in addition a philosophy, a system, and a profound scheme of the universe revealed to him in vision. But within what category could Blake be imprisoned? He outsoars them all and includes them all. We can only say that the dominant impression he leaves with us that is of his vivid, intimate consciousness of the Divine presence and his att.i.tude of devotion.

We have seen that the earliest mystical thought came into this country by way of the writings of "Dionysius" and of the Victorines (Hugh and Richard of St Victor), and it is this type of thought and belief cast into the mould of the Catholic Church that we find mainly in the little group of early English mystics, whose writings date from the middle of the thirteenth to the beginning of the fifteenth century.[52]

These early Catholic mystics are interesting from a psychological point of view, and they are often subtle exponents of the deepest mystical truths and teachings, and in some cases this is combined with great literary power and beauty.

One of the earliest examples of this thought in English literature is the tender and charming lyric by Thomas de Hales, written probably before 1240. Here is perhaps the first expression in our poetry of pa.s.sionate yearning of the soul towards Christ as her true lover, and of the joy of mystic union with Him. A maid of Christ, says the poet, has begged him to "wurche a luve ron" (make a love-song), which he does; and points out to her that this world's love is false and fickle, and that worldly lovers shall pa.s.s away like a wind's blast.

Hwer is Paris and Heleyne That weren so bright and feyre on bleo: Amadas, Tristram and Dideyne Yseude and alle theo: Ector with his scharpe meyne And Cesar riche of wor[l]des feo?

Heo beoth iglyden ut of the reyne, So the schef is of the cleo.

As the corn from the hill-side, Paris and Helen and all bright lovers have pa.s.sed away, and it is as if they had never lived.

But, maid, if you want a lover, he continues, I can direct you to one, the fairest, truest, and richest in the whole world. Henry, King of England, is his va.s.sal, and to thee, maid, this lover sends a message and desires to know thee.

Mayde to the he send his sonde And wilneth for to beo the cuth.

And so the poem goes on to express in simple terms of earthly love, the pa.s.sionate delight and joy and peace of the soul in attaining to union with her G.o.d, in whose dwelling is perfect bliss and safety.

This poem is a delicate example of what is called "erotic mysticism,"

that is the love and attraction of the soul for G.o.d, and of G.o.d for the soul, expressed in the terms of the love between man and woman. It is a type of expression characteristic of the great mystics of the Catholic Church, especially in the Middle Ages,[53] and we find a good deal of it in our earliest mystical writers. One of the most charming examples of it other than this lyric, is the chapter "Of Love" in the _Ancren Riwle_, or Rule for Anch.o.r.esses, written probably early in the thirteenth century. An account is there given, quite unsurpa.s.sed for delicate beauty, of the wooing of the soul by G.o.d.[54] On the whole, however, this type of mysticism is rare in England, and we scarcely meet it again after these early writers until we come to the poems of Crashaw. The finest expression of it is the Song of Solomon, and it is easy to see that such a form of symbolism is specially liable to degradation, and is open to grave dangers, which it has not always escaped. Yet, in no other terms known to man is it possible so fully to express the sense of insatiable craving and desire as well as the rapture of intimate communion felt by the mystic towards his G.o.d, as in the language of that great pa.s.sion which, in its purest form, is the best thing known to man and his highest glory. "I saw Him, and sought Him, I had Him and I wanted Him." Could any words more completely express the infinity of love's desire, ever unsatisfied even in possession, than does this love-cry from the heart of Julian the anch.o.r.ess of Norwich?

The intensity and freshness of religious feeling of a mystical type in England in the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries are often not realised, partly owing to the fact that much of the religious writing of this time is still in ma.n.u.script. The country was full of devotees who had taken religious vows, which they fulfilled either in the many monasteries and convents, or often in single cells, as "hermit"

or "anch.o.r.ess." Here they lived a life devoted to contemplation and prayer, and to the spiritual a.s.sistance of those who sought them out.

The hermits, of whom there were a large number, were apparently free to move from one neighbourhood to another, but the woman recluse, or "anch.o.r.ess," seldom or never left the walls of her cell, a little house of two or three rooms built generally against the church wall, so that one of her windows could open into the church, and another, veiled by a curtain, looked on to the outer world, where she held converse with and gave counsel to those who came to see her. Sometimes a little group of recluses lived together, like those three sisters of Dorsets.h.i.+re for whom the _Ancren Riwle_ was written, a treatise which gives us so many homely details of this type of life.

Richard Rolle (_c._ 1300-1349), of Hampole, near Doncaster, and the Lady Julian, a Benedictine nun of Norwich (1342-_c._1413), are the two most interesting examples of the mediaeval recluse in England. Both seem to have had a singular charm of character and a purity of mystical devotion which has impressed itself on their writings. Richard Rolle, who entered upon a hermit's life at nineteen on leaving Oxford, had great influence both through his life and work on the whole group of fourteenth-century religious writers, and so on the thought of mediaeval England. His contemporaries thought him mad, they jeered at him and abused him, but he went quietly on his way, preaching and writing. Love forced him to write; love, he said, gave him wisdom and subtlety, and he preached a religion of love. Indeed the whole of his work is a symphony of feeling, a song of Love, and forms a curious reaction against the exaltation of reason and logic in scholasticism. He wrote a large number of treatises and poems, both in Latin and English, lyrical songs and alliterative homilies, burning spiritual rhapsodies and sound practical sermons, all of which were widely known and read. Certain points about Rolle are of special interest and distinguish him from other mystics and seers. One is that for him the culminating mystical experience took the form of melody, rhythm, harmony. He is the most musical of mystics, and where others "see" or "feel" Reality, he "hears" it. Hence his description of his soul's adventures is peculiarly beautiful, he thinks in images and symbols of music, and in his writings we find some of the most exquisite pa.s.sages in the whole literature of mysticism, veritable songs of spiritual joy. In the _Fire of Love_, perhaps the finest of his more mystical works, he traces in detail his journey along the upward path. This is very individual, and it differs in some important respects from other similar records. He pa.s.sed through the stage of "purgation,"

of struggle between the flesh and spirit, of penitence and aspiration, through "illumination," until he reached, after nearly three years, the third stage of contemplation of G.o.d through love.[55]

In this condition, after about a year, "the door of heaven yet biding open," he experienced the three phases to which he gives the names of "calor, canor, dulcor," heat, song, and sweetness. "Heat soothly I call when the mind truly is kindled in Love Everlasting, and the heart on the same manner to burn not hopingly, but verily is felt."[56]

This "burning" seems to have been for him a real physical sensation, a bodily condition induced by the adventure of the spirit. This is not unusual in mystical states, and possibly the cryptic notes made by Pascal record a similar experience.[57] He continued in this warmth for nine months, when suddenly he felt and heard the "canor," the "spiritual music," the "invisible melody" of heaven. Here is his description of his change from "burning love" to the state of "songful love."

Whilst ... I sat in chapel, in the night, before supper, as I my psalms sung, as it were the sound of readers or rather singers about me I beheld. Whilst also, praying to heaven, with all desire I took heed, suddenly, in what manner I wot not, in me the sound of song I felt; and likeliest heavenly melody I took, with me dwelling in mind. Forsooth my thought continually to mirth of song was changed: and as it were the same that loving I had thought, and in prayers and psalms had said, the same in sound I showed, and so forth with [began] to sing that [which] before I had said, and from plenitude of inward sweetness I burst forth, privily indeed, alone before my Maker.[58]

The sweetness of this inward spiritual song is beyond any sound that may be heard with bodily ears, even lovers can only catch s.n.a.t.c.hes of it.

"Worldly lovers soothly words or ditties of our song may know, for the words they read: but the tone and sweetness of that song they may not learn."[59] The final stage of "sweetness" seems really to include the other two, it is their completion and fruition. The first two, says Rolle, are gained by devotion, and out of them springs the third.[60]

Rolle's description of it, of the all-pervading holy joy, rhythm, and melody, when the soul, "now become as it were a living pipe," is caught up into the music of the spheres, "and in the sight of G.o.d ... joying sounds,"[61] deserves to be placed beside what is perhaps the most magnificent pa.s.sage in all mystical literature, where Plotinus tells us of the choral dance of the soul about her G.o.d.[62]

Enough has been said to show that Rolle is a remarkable individual, and one of the most poetic of the English religious mystical writers, and it is regrettable that some of his other works are not more easily accessible. Unfortunately, the poem with which his name is generally a.s.sociated, _The p.r.i.c.ke of Conscience_, is entirely unlike all his other work, both in form and matter. It is a long, prosaic and entirely unmystical homily in riming couplets, of a very ordinary mediaeval type, stirring men's minds to the horrors of sin by dwelling on the pains of purgatory and h.e.l.l. It would seem almost certain, on internal evidence, that the same hand cannot have written it and the _Fire of Love_, and recent investigation appears to make it clear that Rolle's part in it, if any, was merely of the nature of compilation or translation of some other work, possibly by Grosseteste.[63]

Of the life of the Lady Julian we know very little, except that she was almost certainly a Benedictine nun, and that she lived for many years in an anch.o.r.ess's cell close to the old church of St Julian at Conisford, near Norwich. But her character and charm are fully revealed in the little book she has left of _Revelations of Divine Love_, which contains a careful account of a definite psychological experience through which she pa.s.sed on the 8th day of May 1373, when she was thirty years of age.

She adds to this record of fact certain commentaries and explanations which, she says, have been taught her gradually in the course of the subsequent twenty years. This experience, which lasted altogether between five and six hours, was preceded by a seven days' sickness most vividly described, ending in a semi-rigidity of the body as if it were already half dead, and it took the form of sixteen "Shewings" or "Visions." These, she says, reached her in three ways, "by bodily sight, by word formed in mine understanding" (verbal messages which took form in her mind), "and by spiritual sight." But of this last, she adds, "I may never fully tell it."[64] It is impossible here to do justice to this little book, for it is one of the most important doc.u.ments in the history of mysticism. There is no mention in it of any preliminary "purgative" stage, nor of any ultimate experience of ecstasy; it is simply--if one may so put it--a narrative of certain intimate talks with G.o.d, once granted, when, during a few hours of the writer's life, He explained various difficulties and made clear to her certain truths. The impression left of the nearness of G.o.d to the soul was so vivid and sustaining, that it is not possible to read the record of it, even now, across six hundred years, without feeling strangely stirred by the writer's certainty and joy.

Her vision is of Love: Love is its meaning, and it was shown her for Love; she sees that G.o.d is Love and that G.o.d and man are one. "G.o.d is nearer to us than our own soul, for man is G.o.d, and G.o.d is in all." If we could only know ourselves, our trouble would be cleared away, but it is easier to come to the knowing of G.o.d than to know our own soul.[65] "Our pa.s.sing life here that we have in our sense-soul knoweth not what our Self is," and the cause of our disease is that we rest in little things which can never satisfy us, for "our Soul may never have rest in things that are beneath itself." She actually saw G.o.d enfolding all things.

"For as the body is clad in the cloth, and the flesh in the skin, and the bones in the flesh, and the heart in the whole, so are we, soul and body, clad in the Goodness of G.o.d, and enclosed." She further had sight of all things that are made, and her description of this "Shewing" is so beautiful and characteristic that it must be given in her own words.

"In this same time our Lord shewed me a spiritual sight of His homely loving.... He shewed me a little thing, the quant.i.ty of an hazel-nut, in the palm of my hand; and it was as round as a ball. I looked thereupon with the eye of my understanding, and thought: _What may this be_? And it was answered generally thus: _It is all that is made_. I marvelled how it might last, for methought it might suddenly have fallen to naught for little[ness]. And I was answered in my understanding: _It lasteth, and ever shall [last]