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THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE 
 
THE 
 
 MAGIC o/EXPERIENCE 
 
 A CONTRIBUTION 
 TO THE THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE 
 
 BY 
 
 H. STANLEY REDGROVE 
 
 B.Sc. (Lond.), F.C.S. 
 
 WITH AN INTRODUCTION 
 
 BY 
 
 SIR W. F. BARRETT, F.R.S. 
 
 1915 • J. M. DENT & SONS LTD. 
 
 LONDON AND TORONTO 
 NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON y CO. 
 

 tH6tMiD 
 
 
 e 
 
This Book is humbly dedicated to 
 
 THE Memory of the Great Men 
 
 WHOSE Experience and Thought, 
 
 AS embodied in their Works, 
 
 have made the Writing of it possible. 
 
 331721 
 
Enter into His gates with thanksgiving. 
 
 And into His courts with praise : 
 
 Give thanks unto Him, and bless His name. 
 
 Psalm c. 4. 
 
 \ Truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be 
 believ'd. — ^William Blake : The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, 
 
PREFACE 
 
 It is sometimes said that, whereas Science pro- 
 gresses, Philosophy is stagnant. I beheve that 
 this is profoundly false ; but there is this fragment 
 of truth in the assertion : — Science is concerned 
 with problems which are not ultimate — the ques- 
 tions she sets herself to answer are questions 
 concerning the correlation of phenomena, not 
 ^ concerning their Source or ultimate significance — 
 hence Science is continually solving her problems : 
 but no sooner has she solved one than, as in the 
 
 ^case of the heads of the hydra-headed monster of 
 legend, another rises to take its place. Philosophy, 
 on the other hand, never solves her problems, just 
 
 '*^ because they are ultimate problems. But this is 
 
 by no means to say that she is stagnant and never 
 
 progresses, because she is continually approaching, 
 
 though she may never gain, the final answer to her 
 
 questioning. I do not think it unhkely that, had 
 
 I lived in the days of Plato, I should have written 
 
 a book on the theory of knowledge, and discussed 
 
 some of the questions I am concerned with here ; 
 
 but I do not think that it would have been as good, 
 
 i.€., as adequate, a book as this. Or, if this sounds 
 
 conceited, let mc say that I think that it would 
 
 vii 
 
via THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE 
 
 have been a worse, Le*, a less adequate, book than 
 this» The sentiment, at least, is not one of con- 
 ceit* What I really want to express is my feeling 
 of indebtedness to the past ; my consciousness 
 that Philosophy has progressed, and that by having 
 ^ been born late in the nineteenth century, I have 
 profited by this progression. 
 
 The chief sources of my indebtedness may be 
 gathered from the book itself, but a few names may, 
 perhaps, be specified here. And I would mention 
 Descartes first, because, as I think, he teaches that 
 doubt which is the beginning of wisdom. It is 
 necessary, so it seems to me, to disbeheve rightly 
 ^ before one can beheve rightly, — to cast out 
 . opinions based on authority, convention, or mere 
 hearsay, before clear knowledge is possible. And 
 - then I would name Berkeley and Mill,^ because 
 they completed the work of Descartes ; it is they 
 who tell us to believe the clear evidence of our 
 senses — of our consciousness — in preference to 
 the speculative hypotheses of materialistic and 
 deterministic philosophers. But were we to rest 
 here, we should leave a whole world of experience 
 uninvestigated. We must turn to the mystics* 
 to complete the work of the idealists. It is, per- 
 
 * To avoid misunderstanding, let mc at once say that I differ 
 from Mill on many very important points. 
 
 • ** Mysticism *' is a very ambiguous word : I attempt to 
 define it in the course of the book* 
 
PREFACE ix 
 
 haps, difl&cult to select names for special mention, 
 but I think they must be, as concerns my own in- 
 debtedness, those of Jacob Boehme ; John Smith, 
 the Cambridge Platonist ; and, most assuredly, 
 the great Swedish scientist-philosopher-theologian, 
 Emanuel Swedenborg, whose illuminating works 
 deserve to be valued by contemporary philo- 
 sophical thought to a greater extent than is the 
 case. 
 
 I do not want here to enter upon a discussion of 
 the question of the necessity of technical terms to 
 Philosophy. But I would say that I have endeav- 
 oured to avoid all undue technicalities in this book, 
 and I believe that the ordinary reader, to whom the 
 average work on academic philosophy is as intel- 
 ligible as Elliptic Functions or Chinese, will find 
 it, if not exactly hght literature, at least quite 
 easily understandable. It is not, however, I hope, 
 a ** popular ** book, in the sense in which that 
 word implies inaccuracy and superficiahty of 
 treatment. 
 
 There are some people who are never happy 
 imless they can attach a label to everything. They 
 seem, and this is the worst of it, to imagine that 
 this labelling can take the place of adequate 
 criticism ; and they dismiss this and that contribu- 
 tion to Philosophy with a shrug of the shoulders, 
 and the airy remark that it is only Pantheism or 
 
X THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE 
 
 Hylozoism or some other *' ism/' If my own 
 views must be labelled, then I would prefer the label 
 to be one of my own choosing, and I do not think 
 that I can choose a better one than ** Idealistic or 
 Rational Empiricism/* I use the term '* empiri- 
 cism/' because I believe that no true knowledge is 
 attainable apart from experience ♦ I use the term 
 ** rational/' because I believe that bare experience 
 is not sufficient for this end : experience must be 
 ' interpreted by reason* Experience, I believe, is 
 the obverse of a coin of which the reverse is revela- 
 tion : inductive reasoning is, in a sense, a magic 
 ritual whereby fuller or higher revelation becomes 
 possible : but the data of experience are the sym- 
 bolic elements of this ritual, without which it 
 cannot be performed or its products obtained. 
 Finally, I use the term ** idealistic," because I 
 believe that all knowledge is knowledge of ideas, of 
 \ the relations between ideas, and of minds wherein 
 ^ ideas exist. For me, ** ideality " and ** tmreality " 
 are antonyms, not synonyms. I hold that Spirit 
 is the One Substance of the Universe, all of 
 whose phenomena are, therefore, spiritual pheno- 
 , mena, Le., changes of one sort or another in 
 ideas. This last sentence may sound like a con- 
 fession of ontological rather than epistemological 
 faith ; but it is neither possible nor desirable to 
 draw too hard and fast a line of demarcation 
 
PREFACE » 
 
 between Ontology, the science of being, and 
 Epistemology, the science of knowledge. 
 
 Having acknowledged, though inadequately, my 
 debt to the past;, I would, in conclusion, express 
 my gratitude to those of the present who in one 
 way or another have facilitated the production of 
 this book. And firstly, I must express my in- 
 debtedness to Sir W, F. Barrett, F.R.S., not only 
 for having written so excellent an Introduction to 
 the book, but also for having read it in typescript 
 and made several useful suggestions, the majority 
 of which I have been able to carry out. I have to 
 express my thanks to the Editors of The Occult 
 Review, The Quest, and The New-Church Magazine 
 for having allowed me to incorporate in this book 
 material afforded by three of my essays published, 
 one in each of their journals, under the titles, 
 *' The Idealistic Point of View,'* ** The Sight of 
 the Soul,'' and *' The Criteria of Truth/' I have 
 further to offer my hearty thanks to Miss L M. L, 
 Cowen for valuable assistance in preparing the 
 typescript for the press and in reading the proof- 
 sheets, to Mr. H. F. Trobridge for a number of 
 useful criticisms and suggestions, and to Mr, 
 Sijil Abdul-Ali for having read the proofs. 
 
 ri* S« iv* 
 
 The Polytechnic, 
 Regent Street, W. 
 May, 1914. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 Preface •••«•••• 
 Introduction by Sir William F, Barrett, F,RJS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 vii 
 
 X 
 
 PART I 
 
 _ IDEALISM 
 
 SBC* 
 
 1. The Subjectivity of Experience 
 
 2. General Analysis of Experience 
 
 3. On the Differences between Sense-Impressions and 
 
 Mental Images . * , • 
 
 4. (i.) Differences in Vividness 
 
 5. (ii,) Differences in our Control 
 
 6. These the only Differences given in Experience 
 
 7. Matter as a Phenomenon 
 
 8. Matter as a Substance 
 
 9. Criticism of Materialism . * . 
 10* Matter as a Substance Unknowable 
 
 11. Subjective Reality ♦ ♦ • . 
 
 12. The Laws of Nature Universally Valid • 
 
 13. The Laws of Nature not Necessary 
 
 14. The Existence of a Universal Mind 
 
 15. Externality and Will .... 
 
 16. Fallacy of ** Christian Science *' Metaphysics 
 
 17. Objective Reality .... 
 
 18. Nature as Divine Externality 
 
 19. Existence of God more Sure than that of other Men 
 
 20. Spiritual Reality ..... 
 
 21. The Significance of Telepathy 
 
 22. Ideas : Spiritual and Natural 
 
 23. What is Mysticism ?■.... 
 
 24. Mysticism as a Mode of Life 
 
 laii 
 
 13 
 13 
 
 15 
 16 
 16 
 18 
 19 
 ai 
 33 
 24 
 35 
 26 
 ag 
 30 
 31 
 3a 
 34 
 34 
 36 
 38 
 40 
 41 
 43 
 
xiv THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE 
 
 PART II 
 
 SEC* 
 
 a5« 
 
 27. 
 28, 
 29^ 
 30, 
 31, 
 32, 
 33' 
 34« 
 35. 
 36. 
 
 37« 
 38. 
 
 39- 
 40. 
 41* 
 42. 
 
 43* 
 44. 
 
 45- 
 
 MYSTICISM 
 
 The Mystic Quest 
 
 The Rationality of Mysticism 
 
 Views of the " Cambridge Platonists ** 
 
 The Nature of Intuition 
 
 Intuition and Art 
 
 Visions and The Vision 
 
 Visions Nonessential to Mysticism 
 
 Subjective and Objective Visions . 
 
 Relativity of Natural Experience 
 
 Relativity of Spiritual Experience ♦ 
 
 The Emotional Temperament 
 
 Causation and the Metaphysics of Source 
 
 Asceticism and its Dangers . 
 
 The Subconscious Self and its Products 
 
 Conclusions as to the Value of Visions 
 
 The Testimony of Jacob Boehme . 
 
 Discussion of Boehme*s Seership ♦ 
 
 The Testimony of Emanuel Swedenborg 
 
 Empiricism and Rationalism 
 
 Superstition, Science, and Philosophy as Forms of 
 
 Empiricism ... * 
 Mysticism as Religious Empiricism 
 
 PAGB 
 
 40 
 
 50 
 
 52 
 56 
 
 57 
 58 
 60 
 62 
 64 
 65 
 66 
 67 
 70 
 
 71 
 73 
 73 
 76 
 
 77 
 79 
 
 80 
 82 
 
 PART III 
 
 THE NATURE AND CRITERIA OF TRUTH 
 
 46. Absolute Truth Unknowable .... 85 
 
 47. Mathematical Illustrations : (i.) Convergent Scries . 86 
 
 48. Mathematical Illustrations : (ii,) Divergent Scries . 87 
 
 49. Mathematical Illustrations : {iii,) The Hyperbola . 89 
 
 50. All Natural Laws Approximate .... 90 
 
 5 1 . This Statement also True of the Laws of Mathematics 93 
 
CONTENTS XV 
 
 SEC. PAGE 
 
 53. All Knowledge of Truth given by Inspiration • • 94 
 
 53. Induction 96 
 
 54. The Bible as a Source of Truth . . • . 97 
 
 55. Deduction 98 
 
 56. Faith and Sight 99 
 
 57. Swcdcnborg's Attitude 100 
 
 58. The Universality of Reason loi 
 
 59. The True Empiricism and the False . . . 103 
 
 60. Pragmatism ....... 104 
 
 61. The Unity of Goodness and Truth . ♦ . 106 
 6a. Conclusion 108 
 
,.x) 
 
 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 To that large class of thoughtful enquirers who 
 have not made a special study of philosophy, the 
 accompanying volume — to which the author has 
 asked me to write a few words of Introduction, — 
 will be found a useful and lucid interpretation of the 
 facts of experience in the light of a sane idealism. 
 
 The first concept we form of reality is that de- 
 rived from our sense-impressions, and the world 
 around us is regarded as a real and permanent 
 existence independent of mind. Then reason 
 teaches us that what we term ** the properties of 
 matter ** are known to us only as sensations, per- 
 cepts of our minds, and that we really know 
 y nothing of matter in itself, that is, nothing beyond 
 the properties which we experience as sensations* 
 
 How different our concept of the external world 
 would be if we were deprived of some of those 
 gateways of knowledge — the senses — such, for 
 example, as sight or touch ; and again how different 
 if other and more subtle senses — profounder 
 avenues of knowledge — were given to us I Con- 
 sider what concept of matter we should form if 
 
a THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE 
 
 wc possessed merely the sense of sight. Every 
 
 stimulus given to the optic nerve, whether by 
 
 . pressure., electricity, or a chemical reagent, would 
 
 S' he sensed only as a flash of light, and we should 
 thereupon infer that all material bodies, all pheno- 
 
 \ mena, were simply variations in luminosity, and 
 that nothing else besides these had any real exist- 
 ence outside ourselves* So also if we were 
 restricted to any one of our other senses, the ex- 
 
 ^ ternal world in each case would excite but the 
 single idea corresponding to that sense. Therefore 
 all we can assert is that external phenomena arouse 
 \ a succession of mental states, and our present 
 interpretation of those states may be only a little 
 less fallacious than the erroneous interpretation we 
 should give if the human race possessed but a 
 single sensory organ. 
 
 Our ideas of the world without us accordingly 
 contract or expand in proportion to the extent of 
 the means by which that world is perceived. Now 
 perception is impossible without a mind to per- 
 ceive, hence Bishop Berkeley asserted that no 
 object can exist apart from mind. Mind is 
 ^^fc;,«ii.W^ certainly the deeper reality, and nature may be 
 ""*^ merely a construction of, and projection from, our 
 own minds ; nor can we, logically, be compelled 
 to- admit that the physical world exists otherwise 
 than in our thought. But this purely subjective 
 
INTRODUCTION 3 
 
 idealism, or solipsism, was not Berkeley's view* 
 Solipsism denies the existence of other minds, as 
 well as the physical world, except as ideas in 
 one's own mind, and as it maintains that one's 
 own thought and consciousness alone exist, it is 
 pure egoism, Berkeley, however, maintains that 
 whilst matter has no independent existence, the 
 permanence of the physical world and of the bws 
 of nature, as well as the existence of minds other 
 than our own, is guaranteed by the existence of a 
 Universal Mind. Nature and ourselves are, from 
 this point of view, the appearance or vesture of the 
 Divine Idea — the world of Divine Thought, which 
 is the real world ♦ Our sensory experiences are, 
 therefore, not imaginary, but are caused by the 
 will of the Divine Intelligence ; and science is the 
 attempt to decipher the divine ideas expressed in 
 nature, so far as our limited cognition enables us 
 to interpret them. 
 
 Hence the common notion of Berkeley's idealism 
 is seen to be incorrect. For nature does not exist 
 only in the thought of men, nor for the thought of 
 any one man, nor by the united thoughts of all 
 men, but it exists as the symbolical expression of 
 the Divine thought, and is perpetually sustained 
 by the Divine Will. 
 
 Against this view is the difficulty of accounting 
 for the independent existence and activity of the 
 
4 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE 
 
 conscious self, for self-consciousness cannot be 
 regarded as being merely a succession of conscious 
 states — the self is not an idea, not an object of 
 internal observation. Berkeley's answer is that 
 the ego is one of a world of free and independent 
 spirits, such finite minds being related to one 
 another and to the Infinite Mind by their mutual 
 interactions. Bu: even so the difficulty arises of 
 how our self-consciousness regards itself as finite 
 and how the notion of an external world can arise in 
 consciousness. 
 
 iThe idea of force lying behind our sensations 
 gives the notion of externality to the object of our 
 perception. This idea of force is that of some 
 resistance encountered, some opposition to our will, 
 to overcome which effort is needed. But the ego 
 itself is only conscious of its activity when that 
 activity is opposed, that is, when effort is needed. 
 Effort, therefore, lies at the root of consciousness ; 
 an effortless action arouses no consciousness of 
 the act. But behind the sense of effort in the ego 
 lies the feeling of impulse or desire, of something 
 to attain. Effort, therefore, implies desire and 
 opposition to that desire. Moreover, to produce 
 any effort requires power, that is, the exertion of 
 force. Hence, consciousness, in so far as it is the 
 activity of the ego, is force striving to overcome 
 force, impelled by desire or affection ; and the 
 
INTRODUCTION 5 
 
 notion of force is that of opposition to our will 
 from our contact with external nature ♦ 
 
 Whatever view we take, we are, therefore, com- 
 pelled to admit that all our experience of pheno- 
 mena is due to some form of action from without 
 upon our own minds. The materialist says that 
 this action is due to things in themselves, to a self- 
 existent objective world : the idealist says that this 
 action is due to the Divine Mind and Will. To 
 the materiahst, the stream of consciousness within 
 us accompanies the brain-processes, as a shadow 
 accompanies an object : mind is thus regarded as 
 an epiphenomenon of the brain-processes, and as 
 having no existence apart from these processes* 
 To the idealist, the position is reversed : matter is, 
 as it were, the shadow thrown by thought, and has 
 no existence apart from thought. Another school 
 of philosophy regards both mind and matter as 
 equally real, but as having no causal relation to each 
 other; matter and mind are supposed to ptursue 
 parallel paths which never intersect. Again, 
 another school, like that of Kant, regards matter 
 and mind as two aspects of a supreme reality, 
 which is unknown to us ; — mind and matter being 
 appearances of that underlying reality, which some, 
 with Spencer, call "The Unknowable,** others, 
 with Kant, call ** God.*' The laws of nature reveal 
 order because our sense-impressions are partial 
 
6 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE 
 
 manifestations in our finite minds of the archetypes 
 of their existence in the Infinite and Supreme 
 Order, 
 
 That this ultimate reality is Mind, an originating 
 Divine Mind — of which our human minds give us 
 a faint adumbration — ^appears unquestionable from 
 many converging reasons and streams of evidence. 
 Take, for example, the intelligibility and continuity 
 of nature. We can read and understand the 
 expression of human thought in a printed page 
 because we have something in common with the 
 writer of the page, and that something is mind* 
 The printed words do not enable us to see the 
 author, nor do they remotely resemble him. But 
 the printed signs are intelligible because our intel- 
 ligence is related to his intelligence. And so the 
 mental signs which the phenomena of nature 
 present to us are not the real world, for the world 
 of ontology, the world of Divine Thought, is in- 
 accessible to us. But these signs reveal order and 
 purpose and we can more or less imperfectly 
 interpret those signs, because they arc an expression 
 of an Intelligence which is related to our intelligence 
 and can communicate with our minds. As the 
 processes of nature, the forms and wonder of life, 
 reveal intelHgence, purpose, and will, we are there- 
 fore driven to conclude that the ultimate reahty 
 lying behind nature must be a Supreme Mind. 
 
INTRODUCTION f 
 
 As I have said elsewhere, ** To the pure 
 materialist the Universe is self-sustained and has no 
 deeper meaning than the appearance it presents 
 to our senses ; these appearances are to him the 
 ultimate reality ♦^ He sees nature, as it were like 
 the curious orderly marks on a printed page, but 
 it conveys to him — as the page does to a person who 
 cannot read — no deeper meaning; he attributes 
 the order, regularity, and continuity of the printing 
 to the interaction of the black marks among them- 
 selves, a chance collocation of atoms* Or he forms 
 a mechanical theory of the Universe by endowing 
 atoms with some occult power, and conferring 
 upon them the very properties which have to be 
 explained/* ' 
 
 In an admirable, though too little known, paper 
 on ** The Origin of Force,*' which Sir John 
 Herschel published some fifty years ago, he 
 remarks — ** The first and greatest question which 
 Philosophy has to resolve in its attempts to make 
 out a Cosmos is whether we can derive any Hght 
 from our internal consciousness of thought, reason, 
 power, will, motive, design — or not : whether, that 
 
 ^Or rather he postulates a material self-existent universe 
 as the ultimate reality^ a universe which happens to excite 
 sensation and experience. 
 
 » The Contemporary Review, June 1914. Sec also the present 
 writer's Utile book on Creative Thought and the Problem of Evil 
 (Watkins^ 19x4)* 
 
8 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE 
 
 is to say, nature is or is not more interpretable by 
 supposing these things (be they what they may) 
 to have had, or to have, to do with its arrangements. 
 Constituted as the human mind is, if nature be not 
 interpretable through these conceptions, it is not 
 interpretable at all ; and the only reason we can 
 have for troubling ourselves about it is the utili- 
 tarian one of bettering our condition by * subduing 
 nature * to our use, ♦ ♦ . or the satisfaction of that 
 sort of aimless curiosity which can find its gratifi- 
 cation in scrutinising everything and compre- 
 hending nothing* But if these attributes of mind 
 are not consentaneous, they are useless in the way 
 of explanation. Will without Motive, Power with- 
 out Design, Thought opposed to Reason, would 
 be admissible in explaining a chaos, but would 
 render little aid in accounting for anything else/* * 
 Philosophy is thus the re-thinking of experience. 
 In the latter part of this volume, the author shows 
 that whilst truth cannot be attained apart from 
 experience, there are, nevertheless, forms of ex- 
 perience which transcend our recognised sense- 
 perceptions. Telepathy is one of these : and 
 the higher intuitions which prophets, poets, and 
 mystics in all ages have had, reveal a profounder 
 world than that of ** sense and outward things." 
 
 'Sir J. W. Herschel: Lectures on Scientific Subjects, 
 P* 475* 
 
INTRODUCTION 9 
 
 Life, which, to the eye of sense alone, breaks itself 
 up into a multiplicity of forms, and individuals 
 endowed with consciousness, seemingly a collection 
 of independent self-existing facts, is by intuition 
 recognised as only varied modes of one infinite life^ 
 We are seen to be parts of a larger whole, beings 
 in an ideal order* Thus we are led to realise that 
 that which is of highest importance in each indi- 
 vidual life is the recognition, the development, and 
 the manifestation of the divine life within* 
 
 WILLIAM F* BARRETT* 
 
PARTI 
 IDEALISM 
 
THE 
 MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE 
 
 PART I 
 
 IDEALISM 
 
 § 1 . All experience is subjective, ue. exists within The Sub- 
 the mind of the individual who experiences. But Experience 
 in spite of the self-evident nature of this fact, its 
 significance does not seem always to be fully 
 recognised ; otherwise, materialistic theories of 
 the Cosmos would be propounded with a less 
 degree of assurance than is actually the case. For 
 as Berkeley showed, and as will be plain in the 
 sequel, the fact that all experience is subjective 
 is incompatible with materialism ; unfortunately, 
 however, Berkeley is very frequently misunder- 
 stood and supposed to teach that experience is 
 unreliable, an idea quite alien to Ideahsm. 
 
 § 2. In order to get at the root of the matter, General 
 let us attempt an analytical examination of experi- Expenwice 
 ence in general, ridding ourselves as far as possible 
 of all preconceptions on the subject. In the 
 first place, then, we may distinguish between what 
 
 13 
 
14 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§a 
 
 are respectively termed ** sense-impressions ** or 
 ** ideas of sensation " and ** ideas of the imagina- 
 tion ** or '* mental images/' Thus, at the present 
 moment I am experiencing numerous sensations, 
 
 \ chiefly visual sensations of colour, which go to 
 make up my study in which I am writing and the 
 various objects it contains. If I care to shut my 
 eyes, however, I can at once transport myself into 
 entirely different surroundings ; but what I then 
 
 \ experience are images created by my imagination, 
 not sensations. The feelings or emotions arising 
 
 "^ on account of sense-impressions and mental images 
 may be grouped together as a third element of 
 experience. And, as a fourth element, may be 
 grouped together all those experiences, e.g., visions, 
 intuitions, etc., which are termed ** spiritual,*' in 
 contradistinction from the other three '* natural " 
 elements. The existence of the first three elements 
 of experience no one denies, but the same cannot be 
 said of this alleged fourth element. I shall deal 
 with this question more especially in Part II. 
 With the third element in experience specified 
 - above (feelings and emotions) I am not concerned 
 in this book, except in so far as this tends to become 
 identified with the fourth element (visions and 
 intuitions). What I am immediately concerned 
 with is the distinction between the first two ele- 
 ments (sensations and mental images). 
 
$3] IDEALISM 15 
 
 § 3. In common opinion and according to the On the dif- 
 terms of materialistic philosophy, sensations and tween Sense 
 mental images differ from each other inasmuch ^^P{^|^*J2f 
 as sensations arise on account of a material world Images 
 external to us, with which they are immediately 
 connected, whilst mental images do not so arise, 
 and have no immediate connection with this 
 material world ♦ Thus, I have a visual sensation 
 of red at the present moment, because there happens 
 to be a red-coloured book, a material book, existing 
 in the material world outside of me in the line of 
 my vision, but I cannot have at the moment a 
 similar sensation of purple, because a purple- 
 coloured object, with which I can put my eyes in a 
 similar relation, is not handy* I must, therefore, 
 be content with a mental image of purple, which I 
 can obtain without the aid of the material world, 
 except, of course, that part of it I call *' my brain/* 
 A moment's consideration, however, shows us that 
 this is not a statement of the differences between 
 sensations and mental images as experienced — the 
 differences, ue,, in virtue of which we are entitled 
 to divide our experiences into these two categories, 
 and in virtue of which we can determine to which 
 category any one of our experiences belongs. It 
 is not this, but a hypothesis to explain such differ- 
 ences assumed existent. It may be a valid hypo- 
 thesis ; on the other hand, it may not. Let us, 
 
i6 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§3 
 
 however, attempt a statement of these differences 
 without involving ourselves in any hypotheses 
 whatever — then, and not until then, when we 
 know the differences that need explaining, shall 
 we be in a position to suggest a hypothesis in 
 explanation of these differences^ 
 
 tncS^^^' §4. An examination of one's own experience 
 Vividness reveals two differences between those forms of 
 experience termed respectively ** sense-impres- 
 sions ** and ** mental images/* In the first place, 
 sense-impressions are generally very vivid com- 
 pared with mental images* This difference, how- 
 ever, is a purely relative one. Sensations which 
 are not attended to and barely penetrate the fringe 
 of consciousness can hardly be called vivid ; whilst 
 in dreams, on the other hand, whatever may be 
 the cause, the dramatic images in our imaginations 
 take on an apparent vividness comparable only 
 with the sense-impressions of our daily life.^ 
 
 {ii,) Differ- § 5. The second and more fundamental dis- 
 
 Comro?°"' tinction between sense-impressions and ideas of 
 
 the imagination is to be found in the degree of 
 
 control we have over them. If I desire to do so, 
 
 * The reason may be that lacking any sense-impressions with 
 which to compare them, the images of our dreams appear far 
 more vivid than would otherwise be the case. 
 
§5] IDEALISM 17 
 
 merely by an effort of will I can conjure up in my 
 mind a complete mental image of an orange, Le,, 
 not merely a visual image of an orange, but repre- 
 sentatives of all the sense-impressions connoted by 
 the term, such as the characteristic taste, odour, 
 etc. But in order to experience the correspond- 
 ing sense-impressions, I must first of all experience 
 certain other sense-impressions — such complex 
 series of sensations I call ** going to the fruiterer's 
 and buying an orange,*' or ** instructing some one 
 to procure me an orange,*' etc, — and it is, of course, 
 quite possible that in any given case I may not be 
 able to obtain the desired sense-impression how- 
 ever much I may strive so to do. 
 
 Sense-impressions always occur in certain 
 groups and follow definite and fixed orders. Thus, 
 the characteristic gustatory and odoriferous sensa- 
 tions connoted by the term ** orange " are always 
 accompanied by such sensations as those of round- 
 ness, smoothness, yellowness, etc. Or to take 
 another example : the complex series of sense- 
 impressions called ** putting one's hand in the 
 fire " is invariably followed by an intense sensa- 
 tion of pain. These orders in the groupings and 
 sequences of sense-impressions constitute what are 
 called ** the laws of Nature," and our control of our 
 sense-impressions is strictly limited thereby. It 
 is quite easy to call up in the mind representations 
 
 B 
 
i8 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§5 
 
 of all the other sense-impressions connoted by the 
 term ** orange/* substituting, however, an idea of 
 pinkness in place of yellowness, or squareness in 
 place of roundness ; but similar groupings of 
 sense-impressions themselves have never been 
 experienced*^ Or to take another example : it is 
 quite easy to picture in one*s mind the process of 
 putting one's hand in the fire, without at all pro- 
 ceeding to conjure up a representation of the very 
 painful sensations which inevitably follow the 
 corresponding sequence of sense-impressions* 
 
 These the § 6, Now, it is of the very utmost importance to 
 
 ferenccs notice that these two differences are the only differ- 
 Experience ^^ces between sense-impressions and mental 
 images of which we have any consciousness, and 
 it is wholly in virtue of these that we divide our 
 experiences into the two groups we call respec- 
 tively ** sense-impressions '' and ** mental images,*' 
 and decide to which group any particular state of 
 consciousness is to be assigned* In everyday life, 
 we have, as a rule, no difficulty in deciding this 
 question ; for, usually, our sense-impressions are 
 very vivid, whilst our mental images are very 
 vague, compared one with the other* And in any 
 
 * It is true, of course, that it might be possible to make an 
 artificial orange to conform to the required conditions, but this 
 does not really alter the argument. 
 
§7] IDEALISM 19 
 
 case of doubt, the method adopted to decide the 
 question always depends, in the last analysis, on 
 the difference in our power of control over these 
 two forms of experience. In dreams, however, 
 the spurious vividness of the dramatic play of 
 mental images deceives us — we mistake them for 
 sense-impressions — and it seems that in dreams 
 our nearly absolute power of controlling the ideas 
 of the imagination is dormant, though it appears 
 that some persons ^ are dimly conscious,occasionally, 
 of a power to control their dreams to some slight 
 extent. But, at any rate, the irregular order in 
 which our dream-ideas succeed one another serves 
 to distinguish them from sense-impressions, which, 
 as remarked above, always occur in definite and 
 fixed sequences. 
 
 § 7. As I have already indicated, the usual Matter as a 
 explanation of the differences between those forms ^^^^^^^^ 
 of experience called respectively " sense-impres- 
 sions ** and ** ideas of the imagination '* is that the 
 former arise on account of an objective world of 
 matter external to us, with which they are in 
 intimate relation, whereas the latter bear no direct 
 relation to this world. It is necessary, however, 
 
 •The present writer has experienced this on two or three 
 occasions. C/. Dr. Frederik van Eeden: "A Study of 
 Dreams *' {Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, 
 July 1913, vol. xxvi., pp. 431 et seq.). 
 
20 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§7 
 
 to distinguish between two different uses of tJbc 
 word '* matter/* or rather *' material body/' When 
 an ordinary person, who has not been sophisticated 
 by the tenets of materiahstic philosophy, speaks of 
 a ** material body/* say an apple, what he means is 
 a body that has a certain si^e, shape, hardness, 
 colour, taste, smell, etc* Now, evidently there can 
 be no doubt as to the existence of such bodies, 
 since they consist of complexes of ideas of sensation, 
 and when we speak of the existence of a sensation 
 what we mean is that it is perceived. The only 
 point is that it is hardly correct to speak of a body 
 which possesses shape, size, hardness, colour, etc. 
 (unless the reference is to a mind in which these 
 sense-impressions exist, Le., a mind which perceives 
 them) ; it would be more accurate to speak of a 
 body which is this shape, si2;e, hardness, colour, etc. 
 A similar sense of the word ** matter,** moreover, 
 seems to be the only legitimate one with which it 
 may be employed in science — r.e., as connoting 
 the fact or natural law that sense-impressions 
 always occur in definite groups, the name ** material 
 body ** being given to any such group — since, 
 strictly speaking, science is only concerned with 
 facts of experience as such, the orders in which 
 they occur and the relations they bear to one 
 another ; not with the sources or causes of experi- 
 ence. Professor Ostwald, however, who is perhaps 
 
§8] IDEALISM 21 
 
 the greatest living authority on physical chemistry, 
 questions whether the term ** matter ** ought not 
 to be deleted from scientific terminology. He 
 says in his Fundamental Principles of Chemistry, *^ 
 
 '* the idea that there is something more in the 
 
 concept of matter than the expression of a set of 
 experiences and their reduction to a law of nature 
 has persisted from earlier times. Matter is looked 
 upon as something originally existing, which is at 
 the bottom of all phenomena and in a sense in- 
 dependent of them all. The concept of matter 
 can be shown, however, to be made up of the 
 simpler concepts weight, mass, and volume, and 
 it is certainly less fundamental than these. The 
 law of the invariable connection of these properties 
 has already been expressed in the concepts body 
 and substance,** [I should prefer to use only the 
 former of these terms in this sense] ** so there is no 
 necessity for the formation of a new concept to 
 express the same thing. The word * matter * is 
 so closely connected with the ideas mentioned 
 above that it is not advisable to retain it ; we shall 
 therefore not make any use of it whatever.*' * 
 
 § 8. This brings me to the second use of the Matter as a 
 word *' matter.*' By materialistic philosophers ^"^^^^ 
 
 * WiLHELM OsTWALD : The Fundamental r Principles of 
 Chemistry (trans, by H. W. Morse, 1909), § 7. 
 
22 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§8 
 
 the term '* matter *' is employed not merely to 
 connote the fact that sense-impressions always 
 occur in definite groups, but as supplying an 
 explanation of this fact. Matter is supposed to 
 be a thing-in-itselft something existing outside of 
 all conscious beings, independent, in a sense, of 
 all phenomena and all experience. In other words, 
 Matter is regarded as Substance in the meta- 
 physical and not Professor Ostwald's meaning of 
 that term. This hypothetical matter is supposed 
 to possess certain properties or attributes, each of 
 which is held to be responsible for a definite sense- 
 impression. Thus, we find certain sense-impres- 
 sions, such as roundness, yellowness, smoothness, 
 juiciness and a characteristic taste and smell, 
 grouped together, and this we call ** an orange.*' 
 According to the materialistic theory, each one 
 of these sense-impressions is dependent upon a 
 certain property of matter ; we find them always 
 grouped together in this way, because the pro- 
 perties of matter on which they depend are always 
 grouped together in the same portion of matter — 
 the real material orange. We can experience a 
 mental image of a pink orange or a cubical orange ; 
 but we cannot experience the corresponding 
 sense-impressions, because a real pink material 
 orange or a real cubical material orange does not 
 exist* 
 
§9] IDEALISM 23 
 
 § 9» But if one presses the materialist, he is Criticism of 
 obliged to confess that matter possesses neither 
 colour, taste nor smell. The material orange, he 
 will tell you, is not really yellow, nor has it 
 any odour or taste in itself. These, so-called 
 secondary properties of matter, are, he says, not 
 inherent in matter itself, but are produced by the 
 
 ^ interaction between it and the bodily senses. On 
 the other hand, it is maintained that the so-called 
 primary properties of matter, such as size, shape, 
 motion, etc., do exist in it apart from any perceiv- 
 
 "* ing mind. But, as Berkeley showed, the distinc- 
 tion between the so-called primary and secondary 
 properties of matter is essentially a vicious one; 
 for size, shape, motion, etc., are as much ideas of 
 sensation as are colours, tastes and odours, and as 
 such exist equally only in a perceiving mind. 
 ** Some truths there are,*' says Berkeley, ** so near 
 and obvious to the mind, that a man need only 
 open his eyes to see them. Such I take this im- 
 portant one to be, to wit, that all the choir of heaven 
 and furniture of the earth, in a word all those bodies 
 which compose the mighty frame of the world, have 
 not any subsistence without a mind, that their being 
 (esse) is to be perceived or known; that conse- 
 quently so long as they are not actually perceived 
 by me, or do not exist in my mind or that of any 
 other created spirit, they must either have no exist- 
 
24 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§9 
 
 ence at all, or else subsist in the mind of some eternal 
 spirit : it being perfectly unintelligible and involv- 
 ing all the absurdity of abstraction, to attribute to 
 any single part of them an existence independent 
 of a spirit. To be convinced of which, the reader 
 need only reflect and try to separate in his own 
 thoughts the being of a sensible thing from its 
 being perceived/* ^ 
 
 Matter as a § lO, Even according to the materialistic theory 
 Unknowable itself it is evident that we can know nothing of 
 matter beyond its properties, nothing of matter 
 itself, since ex hypothesi matter exists outside of 
 mind and is, therefore, unknowable ♦ Divest an 
 orange of all its properties and what remains ^ 
 If the materialistic theory were true, we should 
 have pure matter, matter in itself ; but, in point of 
 fact, so far as we are concerned, we have absolutely 
 nothing. It seems, therefore, rather absurd to 
 limit the application of the term ** real ** to the 
 hypothetical material orange — using the term 
 ** material ** as the materialists employ it, as 
 denoting not merely a phenomenon, but a thing-in- 
 itself existing apart from mind. Is it not evident 
 that the sum of the sense-impressions connoted 
 by the term, the phenomenal orange, is the real 
 
 ' George Berkeley : Of the Principles of Human Knowledge 
 (edition in Everyman's Library ; edited by A, D. Lindsay), § vi. 
 
 \ 
 
§ II ] IDEALISM 25 
 
 orange, the only orange we do and can know^ 
 In other words, is it not evident that a material 
 body is merely the sum of its properties, which are 
 sense-impressions and thus exist only in mind i 
 
 § 1 1 ♦ To such an extent has our language be- Subjective 
 come impregnated by materialistic ideas that the 
 term ** imaginary '* has come to mean something 
 the reverse of real : the assumption underlying this 
 use of the word, of course, is that reality is 
 connoted by the term ** matter/* It is abundantly 
 evident, however, that a mental image — an 
 ** imaginary *' thing — is a real existence in the 
 individual mind» The comparative unimportance 
 of mental images is not because they are unreal, 
 but because they are almost entirely under our 
 control. If I experience those sense-impressions I 
 call ** putting my hand in the fire,** then, inevitably, 
 I shall also experience a very vivid sensation of pain, 
 and not only this, but it may very probably happen 
 that the possibility of my experiencing other sensa- 
 tions may become permanently inhibited — in 
 ordinary language, my hand may be permanently * 
 
 destroyed. It is highly important, therefore, that 
 I do not experience those sense-impressions I call 
 ** putting my hand in the fire/* But the corre- 
 sponding play of ideas in the imagination implies 
 no such unpleasant consequences. I can mentally 
 
\ 
 
 26 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§ii 
 
 reproduce or imagine the series of sense-impres- 
 sions of putting my hand in the fire and then 
 banish the ideas from my mind. When this 
 power of control over mental images is lost or in- 
 hibited, as in dreams, hysteria and madness 
 generally, they are no longer distinguished from 
 sense-impressions. It is evident, therefore, that 
 we call sensations ** real,** and mental images 
 ** unreal,** not because they are thus distinguished, 
 for clearly both forms of experience are real as such 
 (though, indeed, sense-impressions are generally 
 more ** real,** in the sense of more viwid, than 
 mental images), but because the latter are in every 
 sense our own, originating and existing only in our 
 individual minds ; whereas our sense-impressions 
 are determined according to an order (laws of 
 y nature) imposed on us from without and in virtue 
 of which our control of them is strictly limited ♦ 
 
 The Laws of § 1 2, Of course, in a manner, our individual 
 
 Nature Uni- . . 1 r 1 r 1 
 
 versally Valid sense-impressions are real tor each one 01 us alone ♦ 
 As sensations they exist in the minds of each one of 
 us, and for each one of us alone. But in another 
 manner our sense-impressions are, to a large extent, 
 universally valid. It is not, however, altogether 
 easy to make plain exactly in what way this state- 
 ment is true, without involving the hypothesis of 
 an external world ; and from this fact may be 
 
§12] IDEALISM 37 
 
 concluded the validity of such a hypothesis, when 
 divested of the untenable assumption that the 
 matter of this world is anything more than the 
 sum of its properties, anything more than itself a 
 phenomenon, existing only in mind* For although 
 the external world is external to my individual 
 mind, it cannot be external to mind considered 
 universally. We must, on the other hand, beware 
 of overstating the facts» We are not justified in 
 saying that the world which exists in one individual 
 mind is the same as that which exists in the mind of 
 some other individual. Indeed, we cannot even 
 say that for any two individuals, sense-impressions 
 are identical which are denoted by the same name, 
 for we have no means of directly comparing sensa- 
 tions existing in different individual minds. Thus 
 you and I may agree as to what bodies are red, but 
 how is it possible to determine whether the sense- 
 impression I call ** red ** is the same as that which 
 you call ** red " $* All we can state is the principle 
 of relativity : though, indeed, this is of immense 
 importance. Our individual sense-impressions, 
 said to be one in origin, may or may not be different ; 
 V but the relations or connections between them, 
 we know, are identical. Thus, the distance I call 
 ** one inch '' may be longer to me than to you, but 
 for both of us the distance called ** two inches " 
 is twice that called '* one inch/* My red may 
 
28 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§12 
 
 not be your red, but we are entirely agreed as to 
 what bodies are red* In other words, the same 
 laws of nature are true for all of us : our individual 
 sense-impressions are all subject to the same rules 
 of order and sequence* It is not merely true for 
 me that the series of sense-impressions I call 
 ** putting my hand in the fire ** is followed by 
 intense pain ; this and all other determinations in 
 the orders and sequences of sense-impressions 
 which lie beyond man*s control are true for every 
 individual* A teacher is lecturing at the black- 
 board to an attentive class ; if one of the students 
 experiences, at some moment, a mental image of the 
 blackboard faUing over, it certainly by no means 
 follows that any other, or others, of the students 
 present will experience a like mental image* On 
 the other hand, however, if one of the students 
 experiences the corresponding sense-impressions, 
 each one of the students present will, in general, 
 experience corresponding sense-impressions* This 
 fact is expressed by saying that, in the latter case, 
 the hypothetical material blackboard giving rise 
 to the sense-impressions of a blackboard in the 
 mind of each student has actually fallen over ; 
 though we really know nothing beyond the fact 
 that all the individuals present experienced corre- 
 sponding sense-impressions* 
 
§13] IDEALISM 29 
 
 §13^We must, however, guard against the Jhe Laws of 
 ' 7 ... - Nature not 
 
 error that there is any necessity in the laws of Necessary 
 
 nature ♦ It follows from what has already been 
 said on the subject that a law of nature is merely 
 a statement in terms as general as possible of 
 what sense-impressions we may expect to follow 
 any given series of other sense-impressions. Our 
 knowledge of these laws is wholly empirical, ue*, 
 derived from experience. Indeed, John Stuart 
 Mill, in his System of Logic,^ conclusively shows 
 that this is true even of the most fundamental laws 
 of Science, the axioms of Mathematics, and the 
 term ** necessary ** applies to them in no sense 
 other than that of ** most certain/* Now, the 
 mere certainty of any fact of experience supplies 
 us with no explanation of its occurrence. The 
 supposed necessity of the laws of nature leaves 
 us entirely in the dark as to why our sense-im- 
 pressions should occur in the regular sequences 
 in which they do, or why they should follow any 
 regular order at all. Indeed, the only explanation 
 that is possible is the attribution of them to an 
 active agent, i.e., a Spirit or Will, which pre- 
 fers, for our benefit and guidance, to operate 
 in a regular, rather than in a capricious, 
 manner. 
 
 • See the Section on "Necessary Truths/* 
 
30 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§14 
 The Exist- § 14. Moreover, we find that it is not always 
 
 ence of 2 
 
 Universal necessary to the fulfilment of a natural law, for 
 the preceding sequence of sense-imp.! ssions to 
 be restricted to one mind. Indeed, we often 
 experience the consequents of laws which have, so 
 to speak, worked apart from the individual mind 
 altogether, and we are compelled to postulate a 
 Divine, z.e., a Universal, Mind. 
 
 We cannot, in truth, restrict the Universe to 
 the concept of it in the individual mind. The 
 possibilities of sense - impressions far transcend 
 \ the experience of any individual, or even the ex- 
 periences of all individuals. Processes take place 
 \. which no man has ever experienced, and which, 
 therefore, do not exist in the individual mind, 
 processes which we know must have taken place 
 because the results of such do come within the 
 experience of the individual. We cannot believe, 
 for example,' that the flowers and the trees, the 
 stones and rivers of some hitherto unexplored and 
 uninhabited country, spring into existence the 
 moment they begin to exist in the mind of the 
 explorer. We must at least admit the perennial 
 possibility of their existence as sense-impressions 
 in any and every individual mind. In other words, 
 we must admit the existence of a world external to 
 
 ' All the facts of Evolution may also be quoted in support of 
 the above conclusion. 
 
§15] IDEALISM 31 
 
 us, existing for us as ** a permanent possibility of 
 sensation/' to use John Stuart Mill's apt phrase. 
 This world may be referred to as an objective, 
 material world ; but here, of course, the word 
 ** material ** has a very different connotation 
 from that with which materiahstic philosophers 
 employ it. 
 
 § 15. Care must be taken, however, when we Externality 
 speak of a world external to us, not to understand ^ ^ 
 this in a spatial sense. Materialistic philosophy 
 has made us apt to think of ** within ** as referring 
 to that portion of space marked out by our bodies, 
 and ** without ** as referring to the rest of space^ 
 A little reflection, however, shows that this is an 
 error. By the ** within ** is meant the region 
 where our will reigns supreme, where, flowing only 
 into thought and not into action, the will meets 
 with no opposition ; in other words, the ** within ** 
 is the realm of Imagination. By the ** without " 
 is meant, on the other hand, that region where the 
 will, flowing into action, meets with felt opposition; 
 in other words, the realm of Nature. All our 
 actions may, in the last analysis, be reduced to the 
 effecting of accelerations and retardations of the 
 motions of bodies, and there is no body so flimsy 
 and light as not to exhibit inertia, i.e., resistance to 
 change of uniform motion ; indeed, we can never 
 
32 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§15 
 
 get rid of friction, and that resists, not merely 
 change of motion, but motion itself. Were it 
 possible to annihilate the inertias of bodies, it 
 <. seems highly probable that the distinction between 
 the ** within *' and the ** without *' would vanish ; 
 hence this distinction is not one of space ♦ More- 
 over, however closely we may examine man's body, 
 nowhere do we discover pure will : we do, indeed, 
 observe many of its effects, but so do we in the 
 world that lies outside of his body* We may 
 search the tiniest cells of the body, yet spirit, the 
 ** within,*' eludes us. Evidently, therefore, spirit 
 is not in space. Indeed, no other conclusion 
 could be possible, since space, being an idea, can 
 exist only in mind or spirit ; and if space exists in 
 spirit, spirit cannot exist in space. The fact that the 
 external world is the product of a Will not our own 
 constitutes its externahty, and not any supposed 
 spatial relations between it and us. 
 
 Fallacy of § 16* The laws of nature, i.e., the determina- 
 
 Sdenc'l^^^'* tions of the Divine Will, are universally true; 
 Metaphysics ^^ least, SO far as our experience allows us to 
 judge. It is evident, therefore, that the world 
 of sensuous experience is not an illusion of 
 ** the mortal mind,*' as is taught by the 
 metaphysics of *' Christian Science." It is neces- 
 sary to insist on this point, because it is very 
 
§i6] IDEALISM 33 
 
 frequently thought that epistemological idealism, 
 
 as elaborated by Berkeley and his followers, 
 
 supports this chief tenet of *' Christian Science/' 
 
 Nothing of the sort is true* Berkeley everywhere 
 
 asserts the validity of our sense-impressions, 
 
 arguing against the materialistic philosophers who 
 
 would also (though in another manner) make them 
 
 to some extent misleading. The same laws of 
 
 nature, i.e., the same orderly sequences in our 
 
 sense-impressions, hold good for every one of 
 
 us, whether we know of them or not : the result 
 
 is always that predicted by such laws whether 
 
 expected or not. For example : A student who is 
 
 beginning the study of Chemistry adds a drop or 
 
 two of litmus solution to a mineral acid ; a red 
 
 colour is invariably the result, though the student 
 
 ^ may have no idea what colour to expect, or may 
 
 even, through some error or the other, suppose 
 
 that it will, say, be green. Surely this would not 
 
 be the case if sensuous experience were merely an 
 
 illusion of the mortal mind < Such facts are, 
 
 indeed, entirely destructive of ** Christian Science ** 
 
 metaphysics, which confuses mental images with 
 
 sense-impressions ; though they are entirely in 
 
 accord with the teachings of genuine Ideahsm, 
 
 which sharply distinguishes between these two 
 
 forms of experience, attributing the former to our 
 
 own wills, but the latter to a Divine Will, which 
 
 c 
 
\ 
 
 \ 
 
 34 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§i6 
 
 out of pure Groodness always operates constantly 
 and in the same way* 
 
 Objective § 17, We see, therefore, that whilst the reality 
 
 of the ideas of our imaginations is purely indi- 
 vidual or subjective — '* imaginary ** money, for 
 example, is quite as good as so-called ** real *' 
 money, so far as he who imagines is concerned ; 
 but it will not satisfy his creditors, for their 
 imaginations are not forming a like product — 
 sense-impressions are, in a manner, universally 
 true ; they do, to some extent, inform us of 
 objective truths Hence, we are justified in postu- 
 lating the existence of an objective world, which 
 may be termed ** material ** if one pleases. But, 
 since all experience and knowledge is evidently sub- 
 jective, Le*, existing only in mind, absolute objec- 
 tivity is unthinkable. With the postulation of the 
 Divine Mind, however, this difficulty is overcome ; 
 and we realise that what we, in our ignorance, call 
 ** objective *' is really subjective — subjective to, Le*, 
 existing in, the Divine Mind. 
 
 Nature as § 1 8. Here also is to be found the answer to the 
 
 ternalit^" objection that to make reahty subjective is to make 
 
 reality relative. As I have elsewhere remarked. 
 
 We may quite correcdy speak of the physical 
 
 ** 
 
§i8] roEALISM 35 
 
 universe as an idea in the mind of God ; but this 
 does not mean that it is in any sense unreal — to 
 be an idea in the Divine Mind is the essence of 
 reality ; nought else is truly real save that which 
 is such. And it is because spirit is what it is, 
 because of our hkeness (faint though it may be) 
 to Grod, that this real physical universe is possible 
 to some extent to us as an ideal construction cor- 
 responding to the Divine ideal construction. The 
 * external * world we know is the world as it exists 
 in each of our minds ; the real ^ external * world 
 is the world as it exists in the Divine Mind ; in so 
 far, then, as our ideal constructions are Hke to the 
 Divine do we know Reality ** ^ — reahty, that is, 
 which is not merely individual, but universal and 
 Divine, in other words, objective reality. Of 
 course, when I speak of the physical universe as 
 an idea in the Divine Mind, this must be under- 
 stood as an idea which is outspoken or willed forth ; 
 in a word. Nature is to be understood as the Divine 
 Externality. It follows, therefore, that all science — 
 every endeavour to co-ordinate and interpret sense- 
 impressions so as to eliminate the errors of the 
 individual, and arrive at truths universally valid — 
 all genuine science, is an attempt rightly to read 
 the thoughts of God, rightly to understand His 
 Will. 
 
 * Matter, Spirit and the Cosmos (Rider, 1910), § 87. 
 
36 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§19 
 
 Extenceof § 19* Many persons, however, whilst highly 
 God more ,\ ^, ,. . . ^ , ' . , ^ . 
 
 sure than that desirous of beueving in a God, a Being of Infinite 
 
 of other Men LQ^g and Wisdom, the Creator and Sustainer of 
 every finite mind and of that vast and mighty 
 Phenomenon we call ** Nature,*' regard this fond 
 belief as an act of faith rather than as the product 
 of reason* But we have seen how the logic of 
 experience absolutely forces us into this belief, 
 and, indeed, as Berkeley has shown, we have 
 more sure grounds for a belief in the existence of 
 that Infinite Will and Wisdom we call Grod, than 
 we have for that of finite minds other than our own. 
 
 He says, ** ^it is plain that we cannot know the 
 
 existence of other spirits otherwise than by their 
 operations, or the ideas by them excited in us* I 
 perceive several motions, changes, and combina- 
 tions of ideas, that inform me there are certain 
 particular agents like myself, which accompany 
 them, and concur in their production* Hence the 
 knowledge I have of other spirits is not immediate, 
 as is the knowledge of my ideas ; but depending 
 on the intervention of ideas, by me referred to 
 agents or spirits distinct from myself, as effects or 
 concomitant signs* 
 
 ** But though there be some things which con- 
 vince us human agents are concerned in pro- 
 ducing them ; yet it is evident to every one, that 
 those things which are called the works of nature. 
 
§ 19 ] IDEALISM 37 
 
 that is, the far greater part of the ideas or sensations 
 perceived by us, are not produced by, or dependent 
 on, the wills of men. There is therefore some 
 other spirit that causes them, since it is repugnant 
 that they should subsist by themselves, ♦ ♦ ♦ But 
 if we attentively consider the constant regularity, 
 order, and concatenation of natural things, the sur- 
 prising magnificence, beauty, and perfection of the 
 larger, and the exquisite contrivance of the smaller 
 parts of the creation, together with the exact 
 harmony and correspondence of the whole, but, 
 above all, the never enough admired laws of pain 
 and pleasure, and the instincts or natural inclina- 
 tions, appetites, and passions of animals ; I say if 
 we consider all these things, and at the same time 
 attend to the meaning and import of the attributes, 
 one, eternal, infinitely wise, good, and perfect, we 
 shall clearly perceive that they belong to the afore- 
 said spirit, who works all in all, and by whom all 
 things consist, 
 
 ** ♦ ♦ ♦ Hence it is evident, that God is known 
 as certainly and immediately as any other mind 
 or spirit whatsoever, distinct from ourselves. We 
 may even assert, that the existence of God is far 
 more evidently perceived than the existence of men; 
 because the effects of nature are infinitely more 
 numerous and considerable than those ascribed to 
 human agents. There is not any one mark that 
 
38 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§19 
 
 denotes a man, or effect produced by him, which 
 doth not more strongly evince the being of that 
 Spirit who is the Author of nature. For it is 
 evident that in affecting other persons, the will of 
 man hath no other object than barely the motion of 
 the limbs of his body; but that such a motion 
 should be attended by, or excite any idea in the 
 mind of another, depends wholly on the will of the 
 Creator, He it is who, * upholding all things by 
 the word of his power,* maintains that intercourse 
 between spirits, whereby they are able to perceive 
 the existence of each other. And yet this pure 
 and clear light, which enlightens everyone, is itself 
 invisible to the greatest part of mankind." ^ 
 
 And even if later in the course of this book the 
 possibility of a more intimate knowledge of God 
 becomes apparent, nevertheless Berkeley's positive 
 conclusions still remain true* 
 
 Spiritual § 20. But, it may be asked, cannot Berkeley's 
 
 objections to the existence of material substance {i*e* 
 unthinking substance, existing in itself out of mind) 
 be also advanced against the existence of mind ^ 
 Indeed, did not Hume thus succeed in disproving 
 the existence of soul and spirit, and in reducing the 
 individual to a mere series of separate sensa- 
 tions or phenomena ^ To me, however, Hume's 
 
 • George Berkeley : Of the Principles of Human Knowledge, 
 §§ cxlv, to cxlvii. 
 
\ 
 
 §20] IDEALISM 39 
 
 arguments seem altogether fallacious. Firstly, we 
 
 may note that our sensations are connected, as we 
 
 have seen and as Hume admits, according to those 
 
 definite rules of order and sequence called the 
 
 laws of nature. But not only in this way are they 
 
 connected. If, given every sensation which has 
 
 ever and will ever exist, we could mark out certain 
 
 sequences according to these rules, we could also 
 
 mark out certain other sequences connected by the 
 
 fact of memory. Just as the laws of nature indicate 
 
 the existence of God, so does memory indicate the 
 
 existence of the individual spirit ; and for this to be 
 
 true it is not at all necessary that memory should 
 
 be capable of recalling the whole past history of 
 
 the individual, but merely that it should link 
 
 together every moment of its consciousness with 
 
 the immediately preceding one, so as to make it 
 
 possible to trace out the above-mentioned sequence. 
 
 This memory always does. The sense-impressions 
 
 I call ** mine ** are related to one another quite 
 
 differently from the manner in which they are 
 
 rilated to those I call ** yours ** ; this is just 
 
 because they are mine, z.e., because they find 
 
 their unity in one mind or spirit — myself. 
 
 It may perhaps be incorrect to say that I have an 
 
 idea of a spirit,^'^ and, therefore, of myself as such. 
 
 " Berkeley admits this, but argues that we have a notion of 
 spirit, inasmuch as we know what the word means and that we, 
 as spirits, do exist. 
 
40 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§20 
 
 But the fact that I have any idea at all is to me proof 
 of my own existence as a spirit. For even could I 
 doubt my existence, that fact would itself prove 
 my existence as a doubting, Le., a thinking, being. 
 Descartes was certainly right when he said, ** I 
 think, therefore I am *' — all the argument in the 
 world, though it may do anything with words, can 
 never destroy this fundamental fact of experience. 
 Descartes conclusively shows that if we make 
 clear knowledge our criterion of truth, whatever we 
 doubt, we can never doubt the fact of our own 
 being. 
 
 The Signifi- § 21. But if the individual spirit can have an 
 Telepathy immediate knowledge of his own existence not 
 derived through ideas of sense, may it not be 
 possible for him to have a hke knowledge of other 
 spirits ^ Berkeley does not allow this ; but I 
 think it is necesary to transcend his position, with- 
 out, however, destroying his system as a foundation 
 upon which to build. If we ask two lovers if they 
 know each other's soul only through each other's 
 bodily actions, will they not tell us Nay, and assert 
 a more interior knowledge i Still, lovers are 
 generally prejudiced folk, so the philosopher has 
 to regard their assertions with a wary eye. On the 
 other hand, the phenomena grouped under the 
 term ** Telepathy,** and now recognised as facts 
 
§22] IDEALISM 41 
 
 by all competent authorities (thanks to the un- 
 wearied labours of The Society for Psychical 
 Research), certainly seem to lend some justification 
 to this belief. For here we have the undoubted 
 transmission of ideas from mind to mind without 
 the utilisation of the known organs of sense. It is, 
 of course, true that what are conveyed are ideas, so 
 Berkeley's fundamental position is not threatened ; 
 but such ideas appear to be transmitted by a more 
 interior way than that of physical sense. Hence 
 they are not ideas of sensation, though objectively 
 true. Indeed, they seem to be the result of a 
 direct perception by one mind of the ideas of 
 another, 
 
 § 22, Moreover, as Berkeley recognised, besides ideas : 
 % ideas, we may also have notions of the relations n^^j"? 
 between ideas. Here we seem to touch the very 
 nature of Truth, for objective (f,6,, universal) 
 Truth, seems not so much to reside in our sense- 
 impressions as in the relations between them 
 (vide § 12), Indeed, either inductive reasoning, 
 whereby we pass from particulars to generals, 
 gaining objective truth from subjective fact, has 
 to be scorned as presumption (which all our grow- 
 ing experience forbids us to do), or else we must 
 admit that experience involves a higher element 
 than ideas of sensation and reproductive imagina- 
 
42 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§22 
 
 tion. For, in inductive reasoning, the mind is, 
 as it were, enabled, in the light of a higher vision, 
 to leap ahead and to grasp a truth transcending all 
 the particular facts that are given* We may, 
 perhaps, denominate the object of this experience 
 ** an idea,'' or we may prefer Berkeley's term ** a 
 notion " — the mere words we use are not of great 
 importance, so long as the meaning is clearly 
 understood ; — ^but in the former case, we must 
 admit the existence of distinct classes or grades of 
 ideas — ** discrete " degrees of ideas, to use a very 
 useful term due to Swedenborg* There are ideas 
 which, as it were, are exterior and physical and 
 only inform us of the cortex of spirit ; there are 
 others which are more interior, more spiritual, 
 and allow us to penetrate more closely to the core 
 of spirit. A man who is aware of his sensations 
 may be said to know something of the externality 
 of God ; but how far more deeply into the know- 
 ledge of the Divine Being has the man of science 
 penetrated, who knows and appreciates the laws 
 of nature* And having once admitted a scale of 
 discrete ideas, having once admitted the possibility 
 of penetrating more deeply into the knowledge of 
 God than is possible by the mere observation, 
 without comparison and co-ordination, of the 
 varied phenomena of Nature, who shall state 
 where the process is to end i 
 
§23] roEALISM 43 
 
 § 23. Now, it is to connote this belief that a JJ^^^ ^ 
 more intimate knowledge of God and the spiritual 
 is possible than is given by physical science (Le., 
 the discovery of natural laws by the co-ordina- 
 tion of the phenomena of sense ^^) that the term 
 ** Mysticism '* is here employed. The word is a 
 very ambiguous one, and some remarks on its 
 diverse applications seem a necessary preliminary 
 to Part IL of this book, 
 
 ** The modem mystic/* writes Mr. H. G. Wells, 
 '* is commonly a poor fool, on the verge of entire 
 intellectual disorganisation.*' That there is a 
 large element of truth in this caustic remark must 
 be admitted. We all know the type of person to 
 whom Mr. Wells refers, whose so-called mysticism 
 consists, say, in visiting a Bond Street palmiste, in 
 frequenting the seances of some spiritistic wonder- 
 worker,and in talking analmost unintelligible jargon 
 composed of all that is bad and stupid and nothing 
 of what is really good and wise in Kabbalism and 
 Buddhism. But surely there has been some mis- 
 use of language when the denomination ** mystic ** 
 is applied not only to this ** poor fool,** but to 
 
 ^^ By this I do not mean to imply that the method of Mysticism 
 is unscientific, in the sense of not proceeding by the inductive 
 method (since the reverse of this is my belief as concerns the 
 highest Mysticism), but that the experiences dealt with belong 
 to a different order from that of ideas gained through the physical 
 senses. 
 
44 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§23 
 
 philosophers of profound wisdom and persons of 
 saintly lives ^ Surely, to take a modern instance, 
 we do not reckon Maurice Maeterlinck a **poor 
 fool/* though he is universally allowed to be a 
 ** mystic ** i For my part I prefer to use the 
 word ** Mysticism ** in its nobler, and as I think, 
 truer sense, as connoting, in Dean Inge's fine 
 phrase, ** the attempt to realise the presence of the 
 living God in the soul and in nature, or, more 
 generally, as the attempt to realise, in thought and 
 feeling, the immanence of the temporal in the eternal, 
 ^ and of the eternal in the temporal ; ** ^^ and not to 
 degrade the word by using it as a synonym for 
 intellectual and moral insanity. 
 
 Mysticism as § 24* Before proceeding to a discussion of 
 Life° ^° Mysticism in its epistemological aspect, some 
 further remarks are necessary. Mysticism is not 
 primarily or essentially a system of philosophy, 
 '^ but a mode of life. It is a life of devotion to God, 
 Whose presence is everywhere realised. Some 
 mystics, in other directions notably great, have, it 
 must be regretfully admitted, regarded the true life 
 of devotion as necessitating retirement from the 
 world rather than the performance of useful 
 service to humanity. This error, however, should 
 
 " William Ralph Inge, M.A, : Christian Mysticism (The 
 Bampton Lectures, 1899), p, 5, 
 
§34] IDEALISM 45 
 
 be attributed to the age in which they hved, rather 
 than to their mysticism per se. In spirit, and, 
 indeed, frequently, if not always, in practice, the 
 ethics of Mysticism have more sympathy with the 
 Utilitarianism of John Stuart Mill than with the 
 life of the cloister. Swedenborg is undoubtedly 
 the best guide here, and he develops his system of 
 altruistic ethics — showing that the noblest, best 
 and happiest life is that which ministers to the 
 permanent happiness of others — with a spiritual 
 insight which Mill lacked ♦ 
 
 However, this book is not a work on ethics, and 
 Mysticism as a mode of life is a subject outside our 
 present inquiry. I have called attention to the 
 fact that Mysticism is essentially a mode of life to 
 obviate any misunderstanding that might other- 
 wise be occasioned by my treatment of its less 
 essential epistemological aspect* 
 
 One additional remark concerning the scope of 
 my enquiry is needed. I think that, amongst 
 others, certain of the Persian mystics, such as 
 Sadi, Jami and Jalalu*d-din Riimi, and the mystics 
 of the Neo-Platonic school, are very deserving of 
 our attention ; but not unduly to prolong the 
 discussion I shall restrict myself to dealing with 
 Christian mystics. Christianity, in the Person 
 of its Founder, supplies the mystic with an object 
 of love and worship and an ideal of attainment. 
 
46 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [ § 24 
 
 both definite and worthy in character, such as is 
 completely to be found in no other religious system. 
 Moreover, it is an important feature of Christianity, 
 as is so well pointed out by Sir Oliver Lodge in 
 The Substance of Faith allied with Science, ** that 
 it recognises as good the connexion between spirit 
 and matter, and emphasises the importance of 
 both, when properly regarded/* In virtue of this 
 feature, Christianity, more emphatically than any 
 other religion, tends to produce a well-balanced 
 life and to foster the harmonious development of 
 all the powers of man, both physical and spiritual, 
 thus leading to a sane Mysticism* 
 
PART II 
 MYSTICISM 
 
PART II 
 
 MYSTICISM 
 
 § 25. The mystic seeks to discover God within The Mystic 
 the hidden ground of his soul, and to discern the 
 spiritual significance of the things of nature and 
 sensuous experience. He seeks for God and the 
 spiritual, not merely as logical postulates or the 
 necessary hypotheses of a rational theory of the 
 Cosmos, but as actual facts of experience. As 
 Professor Pringle-Pattison remarks : ** Mysticism 
 . . . appears in connexion with the endeavour of 
 the human mind to grasp the divine essence or 
 the ultimate reality of things, and to enjoy 
 the blessedness of actual communion with the 
 Highest. The first is the philosophic side of 
 mysticism ; the second, its religious side . . . 
 The thought that is most intensely present with the 
 mystic is that of a supreme, all-pervading, and 
 indwelling power, in whom all things are one. . . . 
 On the practical side, mysticism maintains the 
 possibility of direct intercourse with this Being of 
 
 49 D 
 
50 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§25 
 
 beings. . • ♦ God ceases to be an object * . . 
 and becomes an experience/* ^ 
 
 Now this is possible, the mystics assert, because, 
 as they put it, not only is there a sight of the body, 
 but also a sight of the soul. The soul, if its eyes 
 be opened, can see ; and to this sight is God, 
 immanent in man and in nature, most gloriously 
 visible. The outward eye beholds only the things 
 of the physical realm : the inward eye of the 
 purified mystic perceives their spiritual meaning 
 and the hand of the Divine Author of nature 
 everywhere manifest. 
 
 The Ration- § 26. The charge that Mysticism is opposed to 
 Mj^ticism reason, and that the majority of the mystics have 
 been devotees of irrationality, guided only by their 
 feelings, is an unjust one. It is indeed true that, 
 e*g.f certain of the mediaeval mystics of the Latin 
 Church were not free from an unhealthy emotional- 
 ism, but it is manifestly unfair to blame Mysticism 
 for the faults of a comparatively few mystics. As 
 a matter of fact, it would be more true to say of 
 Mysticism that it is the spirit of reason in religion — 
 
 ^Encyclopedia Britannica, nth. ed., art. "Mysticism,** 
 Though that portion of Prof. Pringle-Pattison's definition which 
 I have quoted above is quite satisfactory, it is only fair to state 
 that Prof. Pringle-Pattison's attitude is hostile to Mysticism. 
 Much of his criticism, however, is directed against what has 
 been termed " the negative way,'* which is really a perversion of 
 Mysticism. 
 
§26] MYSTICISM 51 
 
 not, however, a cold, formal rationalism, a thing 
 as much to be deplored as an unhealthy emotional- 
 ism, but a spirit of rationality in which the heart 
 joins forces with the head, and the feelings are 
 given due place. The faith of the mystic is not 
 founded upon the statements of other men, but on 
 the facts of his own consciousness; his religion 
 and his reason are indissolubly united, and as 
 Emerson well remarks : ** When all is said and 
 done, the rapt saint is found the only logician/* • 
 But there is, on the other hand, nothing so alien to 
 the spirit of Mysticism as intellectual pride : the 
 mystic bows his head to the divine revelation and 
 receives with meekness divine instruction, for he 
 knows that God is not divided against Himself, 
 and he realises that reason and revelation are one. 
 His faith in the glorious revelation of the Christ is 
 not based upon the assertions of other men that 
 it is true and divine ; and the rationality of his 
 position must be admitted, for the mere force of 
 an assertion is no criterion of its truth, nor does 
 the truth of this revelation depend upon those 
 historical evidences, which, valuable in another 
 way, do not really touch the kernel of the matter. 
 No ! the mystic has faith in the revelation of the 
 
 * Ralph Waldo Emerson : The Method of Nature (sec the 
 edition of Emerson's The Conduct of Lift, Nature and other 
 Essays in Everyman's Library, edited by Ernest Rhys, p. 41). 
 
52 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§26 
 
 Christ, because he experiences its truth in his own 
 soul; with him, faith has become reason and 
 reason is turned into faith. ** I will not make a 
 Religion for God : nor suffer any to make a 
 Religion for me/* ^ wrote Benjamin Whichcote; 
 and this is the humble, yet independent, attitude 
 of every great mystic. 
 
 Views of the § 27* Of course, it can well be understood that 
 Platonists*' such an attitude could not comfortably exist 
 within the Latin Church, and it is a matter of 
 historical fact that Rome has never regarded 
 Mysticism with a favourable eye : she has barely 
 tolerated in her fold any Mysticism other than an 
 emasculated variety in which a blind following of 
 so-called ** spiritual directors ** — men in authority 
 in the Church — is substituted for the belief that the 
 light of God within the mind, manifesting itself 
 in an enlightened reason and a free conscience, is 
 the true guide in the life of the Christian mystic. 
 Ruysbroeck, perhaps, affords an exception to this, 
 and one or two other cases may possibly be instanced. 
 Speaking generally, however, we must look else- 
 where for the free spirit of true Mysticism — 
 amongst those early Greek Christian theologians, 
 
 » Benjamin Whichcote : Moral and Religious Aphorisms 
 (See The Cambridge Platonists, being Selections from the Writings 
 of Benjamin Whichcote, John Smith, and Nathanael Ctdverwel, 
 with Introduction by E, T, Campagnac, M»A., 1901, p. 67). 
 
§37] MYSTICISM 53 
 
 who so advantageously combined the philosophy 
 of Plato with the religion of Christ ; or amongst 
 the later mystics of Protestant times* Possibly, 
 nowhere else (with the exception of the writings 
 of Swedenborg) shall we find the excellency of 
 true Reason, and its perfect harmony with Divine 
 Revelation, so emphasised as in the works of that 
 seventeenth-century school of mystical divines 
 (particularly Whichcote and Smith), called ** Lati- 
 tudinarians ** by their opponents, to whom their 
 broad-minded spirit was displeasing, but now 
 generally known as the ** Cambridge Platonists/' 
 Writes Whichcote to Tuckney, ** I oppose not 
 rational to spiritual, for spiritual is most rational*';* 
 and again, in his discourse on The Work of Reason, 
 he remarks : ** Man is not at all settled or con- 
 firmed in his Religion, until his Religion is the 
 self-same with the Reason of his Mind ; that 
 when he thinks he speaks Reason, he speaks 
 Religion ; or when he speaks religiously, he speaks 
 reasonably ; and his Religion and Reason is 
 mingled together ; they pass into one Principle ; 
 they are no more two, but one : just as the light 
 in the Air makes one illuminated Sphere; so 
 Reason and Religion in the Subject, are one prin- 
 ciple/' ^ Or as Smith puts it : ** It's a fond 
 imagination that Religion should extinguish 
 * Sec The Cambridge Platomsts, p. 7a^nL • lb, p. 55. 
 
54 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§37 
 
 Reason ; whenas Religion makes it more illus- 
 trious and vigorous ; and they that live most in the 
 exercise of Religion, shall find their Reason most 
 enlarged/' * Reason, the Cambridge Platonists 
 rightly taught, is the very voice of God in the soul 
 of man, and through it he may attain to a knowledge 
 of Divine Truth* This, however, is not said of 
 the perverted reason of the sinful man who is 
 bound by the things of sense ; but of the genuine 
 reason of the virtuous soul, illumined by the light 
 from the Source of all right Reason ♦ ** Reason 
 discovers what is Natural ; ** writes Whichcote, 
 ** and Reason receives what is Supernatural/' ' 
 Or as Culverwel (another of the same school) 
 writes : ** 'Tis God, that plants Reason, 'tis he, 
 that waters it, 'tis he, that gives it an increase/* ^ 
 
 John Smith, who greatly developed Whichcote's 
 ideas, and is the clearest and most idealistic thinker 
 of the whole school, definitely identified the purified 
 and enlightened reason with the sight of the soul, 
 and has much of value on this point in his delight- 
 ful Discourse concerning the True Way or Method 
 of Attaining to Divine Knowledge, from which I 
 
 • John Smith : The Excellency and Nobleness of True Religion 
 (i6,p.i86), 
 
 » Benjamin Whichcote : Moral and Religious Aphorisms 
 {ib* p» 67). 
 
 • Nathanael Culverwel : An Elegant and Learned Discourse 
 of the Light of Nature {ib* p. 293). 
 
§37] MYSTICISM 55 
 
 quote the following passages, since the ideas 
 expressed in them are so essentially true of all 
 genuine Mysticism : — ** Were I indeed to define 
 Divinity,** he writes, *' I should rather call it a 
 Divine life, then a Divine science ; it being some- 
 thing rather to be understood by a Spiritual sensa- 
 tion, then by any Verbal description, as all things of 
 Sense and Life are best known by Sentient and 
 Vital faculties* . ♦ ♦ Every thing is best known by 
 that which bears a just resemblance and analogie 
 with it : and therefore the Scripture is wont to set 
 forth a Good life as the Prolepsis and Fundamental 
 principle of Divine Science* . ♦ ♦ 
 
 ** To seek our Divinity meerly in Books and 
 Writings is to seek the living among the dead : we 
 doe but in vain seek God many times in these, 
 where his Truth too often is not so much enshrin*d, 
 as entomb* d: no; intra te quasre Deum, seek for 
 God within thine own soul ; he is best discerned 
 vo€p^ kira<j>-Q, as Plotinus phraseth it, by an Intel- 
 lectual touch of him : we must see with our eyes, 
 and hear with our ears, and our hands must handle 
 the word of life, that I may express it in S» John*s 
 words* "EcTTi Kttt j/'vx^s aia-d-qa-is Tts, The Soul it self 
 hath its sense, as well as the Body : and therefore 
 David, when he would teach us how to know 
 what the Divine Goodness is, calls not for Specu- 
 lation but Sensation, fast and see how good the 
 
56 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§27 
 
 Lord is. That is not the best and truest know- 
 ledge of God which is wrought out by the labour 
 and sweat of the Brain, but that which is kindled 
 within us by an heavenly warmth in our Hearts, ♦ ♦ ♦ 
 ** But how sweet and delicious that Truth is 
 which holy and heaven-born Souls feed upon in 
 their mysterious converses with the Deity, who can 
 tell but they that tast its' When Reason once 
 is raised by the mighty force of the Divine Spirit 
 into a converse with God, it is turned into Sense : 
 That which before was onely Faith well built upon 
 sure Principles, (for such our Science may be) now 
 becomes Vision* We shall then converse with 
 God r(^ vf , whereas before we conversed with 
 him only t^ Stavota, with our Discursive faculty, 
 as the Platonists were wont to distinguish/* * 
 
 The Nature § 28, *' Mysticism,** wrote the late C, C, Massey, 
 o ntuition *i ^g ^ peculiar vital apprehension of spiritual prin- 
 ciples and energies, and of their functional opera- 
 tions in or through man and nature ♦ It claims a 
 certitude analogous to that of sensible experience, 
 and usually designated * intuitional/ Thought, 
 in whatever province it is exercised, seeks to 
 recover for consciousness the synthesis of its 
 related elements; 'intuition* gives this synthesis 
 immediately, and is a direct perception of truth in 
 * Ib» pp. 80, 81 and 93. 
 
§29] MYSTICISM 57 
 
 an organic and concrete unity/' ^ If we use the 
 term ** reason '' merely for the method of deductive 
 logic, then it is true that intuition, that is, the sight 
 of the soul, claims to transcend reason as a method 
 of obtaining truth, though not (apart from the fact 
 that deductive logic is necessarily limited by the 
 premises at hand) in its results. In the truer use 
 of the term ** reason,*' however, as connoting, in 
 Dean Inge's words, ** the logic of the whole person- 
 ality," this is not true ; for the real contrast is not 
 between intuition and reason, but between in- 
 tuition and outward sight, with the logic that is 
 based thereon. Intuition is, indeed, not mere 
 sensuous reason, neither is it irrational feeling, but 
 a synthesis of the highest reason and the highest 
 feeling, in which spiritual truth is experienced as a 
 living fact. 
 
 § 29. That ** intuition " is a real power of the Intuition 
 soul is not only the assertion of all genuine 
 Mysticism, but is attested by all that is truly 
 valuable in Art, for all genuine Art is the manipula- 
 tion of the symbols of nature and experience so 
 that their spiritual meaning may be blazoned forth ; 
 and this can be accomplished only in virtue of a 
 perception (whether conscious or sub-conscious) 
 
 *• Thoughts of a Modern Mystic : a Selection from the Writings 
 of the late C, C. Massey, edited by Prof. W. F. Barrett, F.R.S. 
 (1909), p. 136. 
 
58 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§29 
 
 of this meaning by the artist who manipulates them. 
 To this extent all genuine artists must also be 
 mystics : they must behold the vision — the vision 
 of God in the soul, of the spiritual in the natural ; 
 else they cannot give of the fruits of this vision to 
 humanity at large. As to Wordsworth, so to him 
 who would be true artist, there must come — 
 
 ** A sense sublime 
 Of something far more deeply interfused. 
 Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns. 
 And the round ocean and the living air. 
 And the blue sky, and in the mind of man ; 
 A motion and a spirit, that impels 
 All thinking things, all objects of all thoughts. 
 And rolls through all things/' 
 
 He must experience that ** blessed mood ** — 
 
 " In which the affections gently lead us on, — 
 Until, the breath of this corporeal frame 
 And even the motion of our human blood 
 Almost suspended, we are laid asleep 
 In body, and become a living soul : 
 While with an eye made quiet by the power 
 Of harmony, and the deep power of joy. 
 We see into the life of things.** " 
 
 Visions and § 30, J have spoken of the inward consciousness 
 The Vision . . . 
 
 of spiritual truth given by the intuitive power of 
 
 the soul as vision, and thus is it rightly denominated 
 
 as an immediate perception of Divine verity. But 
 
 " From the well-known Lines composed a few Miles abov$ 
 Tintern Abbey, 1798. 
 
§30] MYSTICISM 59 
 
 generally the term '* vision ** has a somewhat 
 different significance, and is used to denote such 
 experiences as those of Suso, of whom we read 
 that he beheld Mary and her Holy Child and knelt 
 himself in adoration, and of the many other 
 mystics who have claimed to have seen the forms 
 of angelical beings. Such visions may be usefully 
 distinguished from the inward perception of 
 spiritual truth. The desire for the inward en- 
 lightenment of the soul, for the guidance of the 
 Spirit in mind and heart, is one of which all must 
 approve and to which all ought to aspire ; but the 
 longing for visions, during this earthly life, of the 
 inhabitants of spiritual realms, or of our Divine 
 Saviour as He appeared on earth, — which is a wish 
 for ** form ** rather than ** substance ** with respect 
 to spiritual verity, for externality rather than spirit, 
 — to say nothing of the attempt to produce such 
 visions by artificial means, generally, if not always, 
 proves psychologically disastrous ; and was, as a 
 matter of fact, universally condemned by the great 
 Christian mystics of the past. At the same time, 
 however, I think that no fundamental distinction, 
 no hard and fast line of demarcation should be 
 drawn between the two types of vision as actually 
 experienced. Spontaneous visions of spiritual 
 beings may be as genuine and as much the result of 
 the sight of the soul as the interior perception of 
 
6o THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§30 
 
 Divine truth, for such visions may be given to man 
 by God, but only when they have a mission of 
 Truth to telL Truth is still, in itself, one and the 
 same, though it may be expressed in various forms, 
 or in a manner that almost transcends forms, save 
 in the most spiritual sense of the term ; a vision 
 may still be true, and therefore real — in an objec- 
 tive sense, — even though expressed in a symboHc 
 manner. 
 
 Visions Non- § 31^ But this, of course, can by no means be 
 
 essential to ^ . r 11 i • • t j . 1 
 
 Mysticism asserted of all such visions ♦ Indeed, the great 
 
 mystics have always recognised the fact that visions, 
 
 apparently of spiritual beings, may be quite 
 
 illusory, and they have never assigned to them any 
 
 such importance as one would gather from some of 
 
 the statements of Mysticism's opponents. Such 
 
 phenomena, then, whatever their value, are to be 
 
 classed amongst the non-essentials so far as the claim 
 
 to the title of mystic is concerned. The cautious 
 
 attitude of Fenelon in his Maxims of the Saints is 
 
 largely characteristic of the great Christian mystics. 
 
 He writes, ** In the history of inward experience, 
 
 we not unfrequently find accounts of individuals 
 
 whose inward life may properly be characterized 
 
 as extraordinary. They represent themselves as 
 
 having extraordinary communications ; — dreams, 
 
 visions, revelations. Without stopping to inquire 
 
§ 31 ] MYSTICISM 6i 
 
 whether these inward results arise from an excited 
 and disordered state of the physical system or from 
 God, the important remark to be made here is, 
 that these things, to whatever extent they may 
 exist, do not constitute holiness. 
 
 ** The principle, which is the life of common 
 Christians in their common fixed state, is the prin- 
 ciple which originates and sustains the life of those 
 who are truly * the pure in heart,* namely, the prin- 
 ciple of faith working by love, — existing, however, 
 in the case of those last mentioned, in a greatly 
 increased degree. ♦ . ♦ 
 
 *' Again, the persons who have, or are supposed 
 to have, the visions and other remarkable states to 
 which we have referred, are sometimes disposed 
 to make their own experience, imperfect as it 
 obviously is, the guide of their life, considered as 
 separate from and as above the written law. Great 
 care should be taken against such an error as this. 
 God's word is our true rule. 
 
 ** Nevertheless,** Fenelon continues, ** there is 
 no interpreter of the Divine Word like that of a 
 holy heart ; or, what is the same thing, of the Holy 
 Ghost dwelling in the heart. If we give ourselves 
 wholly to God, the Comforter will take up His 
 abode with us, and guide us into all that truth which 
 will be necessary for us. Truly holy souls, there- 
 fore, continually looking to God for a proper under- 
 
63 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§31 
 
 standing of His word, may confidently trust that 
 He will guide them aright* A holy soul, in the 
 exercise of its legitimate powers of interpretation, 
 may deduce important views from the Word of 
 God which would not otherwise be known ; but 
 it cannot add anything to it/* " 
 
 S"i>i«ctive § 32. Before proceeding further with a dis- 
 
 and Objective . 
 
 Visions cussion of seership, I would remind the reader of 
 
 the conclusions regarding the nature of " sub- 
 jective ** and ** objective ** reality reached in 
 Part L In accordance with these conclusions, a 
 ** subjective ** vision may be defined as one which 
 is true only for its percipient ; an ** objective " 
 vision as one which is true universally. The 
 snakes of delirium tremens are in the first category 
 {i.e.t that of subjective visions), and we rightly 
 say that the dipsomaniac is deluded, because the 
 terrible objects he beholds, although perfectly real 
 for him, are non-existent so far as the normal 
 man is concerned : in other words, they exist only 
 in the mind or imagination of the sufferer. On the 
 other hand, when the Psalmist declares that ** The 
 earth is the Lord^s, and the fullness thereof,** ^^ we 
 rightly say, not that he is deluded, but that he is 
 
 *• Archbishop FiNELON: The Maxims of the Saints (AUenson's 
 " Heart and Life ** Booklets, No. i6, pp. i6 and 17). 
 ^' Psalm xxiv. verse i. 
 
§32] MYSTICISM 63 
 
 inspired ; for his vision is true not only for him- 
 self, but for all men who can see aright : it exists 
 not only in his mind but in the Mind of God, 
 Between these two extremes lie visions of every 
 degree of subjectivity and objectivity ; visions, 
 more or less truth-telling, more or less symbolic, 
 in which both elements are blended together in 
 varying proportions. ** One must bear in re- 
 membrance,'* says Fiona Macleod, in lona, ** that, 
 in spiritual sight, there is symbolic vision as well 
 as actual vision* When G^lum ♦ ♦ . hurried for- 
 ward to minister to an old dying Pict * who had 
 lived well by the hght of nature,* and whose house, 
 condition, and end had been suddenly revealed 
 to him : then we have actual vision ♦ When 
 Aithn6, his mother, dreamed that an angel showed 
 her a garment of so surpassing a loveliness that it 
 was as though woven of flowers and rainbows, 
 and then threw it on high, till its folds expanded 
 and covered every mountain-top from the brows 
 of Connaught to the feet of the Danish Sea, and 
 so revealed to her what manner of son she bore 
 within her womb , . . then we have symbohc 
 vision. And sometimes we have that which par- 
 takes of each, as when . • ♦ G)lum saw angels 
 standing upon the rocks on the opposite side of 
 the Sound which divides lona from the Ross of 
 Mull, calling to his soul to cross to them, yet, as 
 
64 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§32 
 
 they assembled and beckoned, mysteriously and 
 suddenly restrained, for his hour was not come/' 
 
 Relativity of § 33* Now, a man's percepts of the things of 
 Experience the material world depend as much upon his 
 physical sense-organs as upon the things sensed, 
 ue*, there are laws of nature connecting all these 
 phenomena. His percepts depend also upon the 
 conditions under which observation is made. To 
 confine our attention to one sense-organ, say that 
 of sight, we know that the appearance of objects 
 depends very largely upon the condition of the eye, 
 and its sensitiveness to the rays of hght, as well as 
 upon the nature of the light in which observation 
 is made. There is no departure from Idealism 
 in asserting this, because, as we have seen, (objec- 
 tive) truth concerning the physical realm resides 
 in the relations between our ideas of sensation 
 rather than in the ideas themselves. We have 
 seen that it is impossible to determine whether 
 my ** red *' is identical with yours ; but in the case 
 of certain persons it is abundantly evident that the 
 red of one is not the same as the red of another. 
 Colour-blindness, in one variety of which, red is 
 not distinguished from green, but both appear 
 identical with grey, is a case in point. And this 
 defect is always associated with certain peculiarities 
 in the structure of the eyes of the persons afflicted 
 
§34] MYSTICISM 65 
 
 with it. But the person suffering from this form 
 of colour-blindness, though he cannot have distinct 
 sense-ideas of red and green, can still be convinced 
 that there is an objectively real relation, and hence 
 distinction, denoted by the words. 
 
 § 34. From facts like these we might, by analogy. Relativity of 
 conclude that a similar principle of relativity holds Experience 
 good in the case of spiritual perception, spiritual 
 verities appearing different according to the con- 
 dition of the soul or state of mind of him who 
 perceives. We are not, however, left to depend 
 merely upon analogy for this conclusion ; that it 
 is a fact is in many ways abundantly evident. 
 Thus, both the true scientist and the true artist 
 perceive a fundamental unity or harmony under- 
 lying the apparent multiplicity of natural pheno- 
 mena, and the unity of which they are conscious 
 is essentially one and the same ; but it appears, 
 speaking generally, under quite different forms in 
 the two cases. Or, to take a somewhat different 
 example, we have evidence of the same principle of 
 relativity in spiritual perception, in the fact that, 
 whilst a good man sees moral truth as it really is. 
 I.e., as it exists in the Mind of Gk)d, an evil man 
 beholds all spiritual things inverted — to him, 
 falsities appear as truths, and evil things as good 
 and greatly to be desired. 
 
66 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§35 
 
 ThcEmo- § 35^ It will be generally admitted that the 
 tional Tern- , . ^ . , . , . , . 
 
 perament emotional type of mmd is one exceedingly given to 
 
 beholding things in a wrong perspective, of tinc- 
 turing its percepts, as it were, with the colours of 
 its own nature* The emotional type of mind, more 
 than any other, projects itself into the things upon 
 which it gazes, not infrequently distorting and 
 exaggerating certain aspects of the same. Now, it 
 is very largely mystics of a rather emotional type 
 of mind that claim to have experienced visions of 
 angelical beings and other visions of this type : 
 the more purely intellectual mystics do not as a rule 
 assert that they have been vouchsafed experiences 
 of this nature. This is easy to understand, if it be 
 admitted, and I think it must be admitted, that, 
 whilst there is an objective spiritual verity under- 
 lying many such visions, their form is largely sub- 
 jective and derived from the seer's own stock of 
 ideas. This seems to be the most satisfactory 
 theory regarding the nature of the majority of such 
 of these visions as can be called genuine. They 
 possessed a reality for the percipients beyond that 
 which they can have for us ; by which I mean, not 
 that they may not have had their origin in objective 
 spiritual verity, but that the relation between this 
 objective reahty and the vision as it actually 
 appeared to the seer was one depending upon his 
 mental nature; with the result that, in many 
 
§36] MYSTICISM 67 
 
 cases, the form of such visions is largely symbolical 
 and even fantastically so, 
 
 § 36, There are further considerations, however. Causation 
 which may cause us to place a not inconsiderable Metaphysics 
 number of so-called visions of spiritual beings in °^ Source 
 what may be termed a lower category. No 
 genuinely idealistic system of philosophy can admit 
 the possibility of physical causation — using the 
 term ** causation *^ in its strictest meaning, and not 
 simply as implying mere concomitance in time or 
 place. But that there is apparent causation of this 
 nature, that the things of the spiritual or mental 
 world are not wholly unaffected by the things of 
 the material world, is most evident. It is evident, 
 for example, from the fact of sensation itself. As 
 Berkeley shows us, ideas do not cause one another, 
 they merely succeed one another. Spirit alone is 
 active, and is the cause of ideas, which are passive. 
 The fire is not the cause of the burning pain I 
 experience if I plunge my hand into it ; it is merely 
 the sign that I shall experience this pain if I act 
 in this manner. The motion of one body is never 
 the cause of the motion of another, though it may 
 be its antecedent. Or, as Swedenborg puts the 
 same truth, ** Whatever exists in the form of an 
 effect proceeds from a cause, that which does not 
 proceed from a cause being separated. Such is 
 
68 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§36 
 
 the case with nature ; all the individual and par- 
 ticular objects belonging to it arc effects from a 
 cause, which is prior, interior, and superior to it, 
 and which proceeds immediately from God. For 
 since there exists a spiritual world, which is prior, 
 interior, and superior to the natural world, there- 
 fore all that belongs to the former is cause, and all 
 that belongs to the latter is effect. The existence 
 indeed of one thing from another is also progres- 
 sive in the natural world, but this is by means of 
 causes proceeding from the spiritual world ; for 
 where the cause of an effect is, there also is to be 
 found the cause of an efficient effect. For every 
 effect becomes an efficient cause in successive 
 order, even to the ultimate, where the effective 
 force stops » But this is continually accomplished 
 from the Spiritual in which alone this force exists ; 
 this therefore is the reason why nothing in nature 
 exists except from the Spiritual, and by means of 
 it.** ^* We see, therefore, that, although all causa- 
 tion is by and from the spiritual, yet, since natural 
 phenomena always succeed one another in definite 
 and fixed orders, since they are progressive, they 
 exhibit a semblance of causation. Indeed, for the 
 purely practical purposes of science and daily life, 
 as distinguished from the needs of Metaphysics, 
 
 1* Emanuel Swedenborg : God, Providence, Creation (trans, 
 by I. Tanslcy, 1902), § 94* 
 
§36] MYSTICISM 69 
 
 we may speak of one phenomenon as the cause of 
 another. ], S. Mill, for example, defined the 
 " cause ** of a phenomenon as those phenomena 
 which are always and unconditionally observed to 
 precede it ; ^ and it is in this sense that the word is 
 generally employed in scientific text-books. There 
 is no harm in this, so long as it is borne in mind that 
 the word ** cause ** thus defined has quite a different 
 meaning from its metaphysical one of ** source,'' 
 which is based upon our consciousness of will and 
 our felt power to produce effects in the external 
 world. Mill, with his usual care and logic, called 
 attention to this, and stated that what he was 
 dealing with were ** physical '' and not ** efficient 
 causes ** ; unfortunately, however, this most 
 important distinction is often lost sight of, and 
 unfortunately also, Mill denied the doctrine that 
 volition is an ** efficient cause,*' and sought to 
 bring the phenomena of will and desire under the 
 category of ** physical causation." The fact of 
 Purpose, however, — the existence of the effect in 
 the realm of Imagination before its existence in 
 that of Nature, or sensation, — serves sharply to dis- 
 tinguish between the relation of volition to its 
 effect, and that of a ** physical cause " (** in- 
 variably and unconditionally antecedent phe- 
 
 *• See the Section on the ** Law of Universal Causation " m 
 bis System of Logic* 
 
70 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§36 
 
 nomenon ") to its '* effect '* (or, rather, ** conse- 
 quent '*), and it is to the existence of Purpose that 
 the first relation owes its epistemologically satis- 
 factory nature. Only when the end or purpose 
 has been discovered can the mind rest from its 
 search, and since the concept of End or Purpose 
 has no meaning as applied to ** physical causation,** 
 the mind is compelled to postulate an ** efficient 
 cause ** — a Will — behind every process of ** physi- 
 cal causation/* 
 
 Asceticism § 37. As concems the causation of sensation, 
 Dangers Swedenborg maintains that there is influx from 
 the spiritual to the natural, from which the latter 
 derives its existence, but not conversely. In man, 
 who has no life or truth in himself, but is a recipient 
 of life and truth from God, this influx is modified 
 according to the condition of the sense-organs ; 
 and thus arises sensation. Indeed, it is most 
 evident that, whilst incarnated, our natural bodies 
 are not negligible factors in our spiritual Hves ; 
 and I venture to suggest that it will be nowise a 
 departure from a sane Idealism, to maintain that 
 an unhealthy and unnatural condition of the 
 physical body is very liable to give rise to visions of 
 an entirely delusive nature. That many recorded 
 experiences of alleged appearances of spiritual 
 beings were of this type is a fact that was by no 
 
§38] MYSTICISM fi 
 
 means unrecognised by the great mystics of the 
 past. As to asceticism/' it must suffice here to 
 remark: (L) That it was largely practised in an 
 extreme form by many of the mediaeval mystics 
 of the Latin Church {e.g*, Suso) ; (iL) That since 
 (Hke the opposite evil, vi2;., debauchery) it is con- 
 trary to Nature, which true Mysticism declares is 
 the expression and manifestation of the Divine 
 Mind, it must inevitably result in unhealthiness and 
 an unnatural state of the physical man : — two facts 
 which warn us to be extremely cautious of setting 
 too high a value upon the visions of many of the 
 Roman Catholic mystics. And, of course, the 
 same caution is necessary in dealing with the alleged 
 visions of other mystics, such as those of the East, 
 given to extremes of asceticism. 
 
 § 38. Moreover, in discussing this question we The Sub- 
 must take into account the workings of the sub- Self and its 
 conscious self. There cannot, I think, be much P^°^"<=^ 
 doubt that many of the so-called visions and 
 auditions of modem clairvoyants and clairaudients 
 (that is, of those who are not in the category of 
 deliberate cheats and impostors) are merely the 
 
 »• For some further remarks by the present writer on this 
 subject see a short article in Morning Light for August, 
 1910 (Vol. xxxiii., pp. 330-333), entitled ** On Pleasure and 
 Asceticism." 
 
73 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§38 
 
 products of their subconscious selves; and no 
 doubt the same holds good of some of the visions of 
 the mystics of the past» Of course, it may be said 
 that all visions are the products of the subconscious 
 self, the sight of the soul being a ** faculty ** of that 
 self* My present reference, however, is not to 
 visions arising through the perception of objective 
 spiritual verity by means of a subconscious power, 
 but to those pseudo-visions whose whole substance, 
 as well as their form, is derived from the subcon- 
 scious self* A modern case of this sort is recorded 
 in a book published in 1909 under the title of The 
 Maniac, a work purporting to be a study of acute 
 mania from the standpoint of the sufferer — a 
 woman-journalist in this case* The voices which 
 she heard, and which she treated as emanating from 
 spirits other than herself, were, as she realised 
 upon her recovery, due to fragments of her own 
 subconscious self which had acquired personalities 
 of their own — the result : dissociation of person- 
 ality, that is, madness* The case of August 
 Strindberg may also be mentioned here* He did 
 not claim to see visions, but at a certain period in 
 his life natural objects began to take on a new and, 
 as it seemed, prophetic meaning to him* Coin- 
 cidences were always occurring, seemingly to 
 direct his life, and whose suggestions he always 
 followed ; until he found himself the victim of 
 
§40] MYSTICISM 73 
 
 paranoia (persecutory mania) ♦ " Indeed, the 
 chronicles of madness are full of such cases, which 
 warn us to be careful in dealing with this subject. 
 
 § 39. But after making all due allowances for the Conclusions 
 factors which produce delusion, there does remain value of 
 a by no means unimportant residuum of cases ^^*°"* 
 which prove that to some souls have been vouch- 
 safed visions of angelic beings {Le., ** the spirits 
 of just men made perfect **) and of the spiritual 
 world : and the materialistic contention that all 
 such experiences have their origin in disease either 
 of mind or body is as untenable as the credulous 
 belief that none are of this nature. 
 
 § 40. The seership of Jacob Boehme, the The Testi- 
 inspired shoemaker of Goerlitz, calls for special jacob 
 mention. Boehme claimed, not to have beheld ^^^^^ 
 and conversed with spirits or angels, but to have 
 seen into the inmosts of Nature. He tells us that 
 he never desired that any such mighty mysteries 
 should be revealed to him ; but ** as it is the con- 
 dition of poor laymen in their simplicity," he 
 writes, ** I sought only after the heart of Jesus 
 
 ^' See in particular his The Inferno (trans, by C. Field, 1912). 
 Strindberg himself attributed his recovery from madness to 
 Swedenborg, whose works he read in his latter days* He 
 interpreted some of Swedenborg's doctrines, however, in a 
 rather unusual manner. 
 
74 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§40 
 
 Christ • . . and I besought the Lord earnestly 
 for His holy spirit, and His grace, that He would be 
 pleased to bless and guide me in Him ; and take 
 that away from me, which did turn me away from 
 Him, and I resigned myself wholly to Him, that I 
 might not live to my own will, but to His ; and that 
 He only might lead and direct me: to the end, 
 that I might be His child in His Son Jesus Christ* 
 
 ** In this my earnest Christian seeking and 
 desire,** he continues, *' the gate was opened unto 
 me, that in one quarter of an hour I saw and knew 
 more than if I had been many years together 
 at an University ; at which I did exceedingly 
 admire, and I knew not how it happened to me ; 
 and thereupon I turned my heart to praise God 
 for it. 
 
 ** For I saw and knew the Being of all Beings, 
 the Byss (the ground or original foundation), and 
 Abyss (that which is without ground, or bottom- 
 less and fathomless) ; also the birth [or eternal 
 generation] of the holy Trinity ; the descent, and 
 original of this world, and of all creatures, through 
 the divine wisdom ; I knew and saw in myself all 
 the three worlds ; namely, the divine, angelical, 
 and paradisical [world] and then the dark world ; 
 being the original of nature to the fire : And then 
 thirdly, the external, and visible world, being a 
 procreation, or extern birth ; or as a substance 
 
§40] MYSTICISM 75 
 
 expressed, or spoken forth, from both the internal 
 and spiritual worlds ; and I saw, and knew the 
 whole Being [or working essence] in the evil, and in 
 the good ; and the mutual original, and existence 
 of each of them ; and likewise how the pregnant 
 mother (genetrix or fruitful bearing womb of 
 eternity) brought forth, so that I did not only 
 greatly wonder at it, but did also exceedingly 
 rejoice* 
 
 ** And presently it came powerfully into my 
 mind to set the same down in writing, for a 
 memorial to myself; albeit I could very hardly 
 apprehend the same in my external man, and 
 express it with the pen ; yet however I must begin 
 to labour in these great Mysteries as a child that 
 goeth to school : I saw it (as in a great deep) in the 
 internal, for I had a thorough view of the universe 
 as in a chaos, wherein all things are couched and 
 wrapped up, but it was impossible for me to 
 explicate and unfold the same. 
 
 ** Yet it opened itself in me from time to time, 
 as in a young plant : albeit the same was with me 
 for the space of twelve years, and I was as it were 
 pregnant (or breeding of it) with all, and found a 
 powerful driving and instigation within me, before 
 I could bring it forth into an external form of 
 writing ; which afterward fell upon me as a sudden 
 shower, which hitteth whatsoever it lighteth upon ; 
 
76 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§40 
 
 just so it happened to me, whatsoever I could appre- 
 hend, and bring into the external [principle of my 
 mind] the same I wrote down» 
 
 ** However, afterward the sun did shine on me 
 a good while, but not in a continual constant 
 manner; for when the same did hide itself, I 
 scarce knew, or well understood my own labour [or 
 writing] so that, man must acknowledge that his 
 knowledge is not his own, or from himself, but 
 God's and from God ; and that God knoweth [or 
 manifests the ideas of His wisdom] in the soul of 
 man after what manner and measure He pleaseth/*^® 
 
 Discussion of § 41* That a subjective element entered largely 
 Seership into Boehme*s visions seems evident from the 
 form in which they are expressed in his works, 
 which borders at times upon the fantastical ; 
 though it might be argued that they were not, 
 perhaps, actually experienced in this form, but 
 merely expressed therein afterwards — certainly, 
 the inspired shoemaker, as he himself tells us in 
 the passage already quoted, experienced great 
 difficulty in giving his experiences outward expres- 
 sion* Boehme was of an emotional temperament, 
 much given to rhapsodising, and in spite of the 
 many most precious jewels of thought and feeling 
 
 ^* Jacob Boehme : Epistles (J* E/s translation. Epistle 11*, 
 §§ 6-1 1, 1 886 reprint, pp, 29 and 30). 
 
§42] MYSTICISM 77 
 
 to be found in his works, there is also a not incon- 
 siderable quantity of what may be termed clay. 
 But after all has been said that can justly be said 
 in criticism of Boehme, the fact remains that his 
 works do contain these jewels, and that from an 
 uneducated cobbler, Boehme became one of the 
 greatest and most spiritual exponents of Christian 
 Mysticism of his own or any other day* That he 
 did experience an inward spiritual enlightenment 
 and that his visions did involve a valuable element 
 of objective spiritual verity, seem beyond reason- 
 able doubt. 
 
 § 42. The case of Emanuel Swedenborg is, in The Tcsti- 
 many respects, even more remarkable and of even e^ucI 
 greater importance. I have said that most of the Swedenborg 
 mystics who claimed to have experienced visions of 
 spiritual beings were of a rather emotional type 
 of mind : the seership of Sweden's great mystic- 
 philosopher constitutes a striking exception to 
 this usually valid generalisation. Like Boehme, 
 Swedenborg ^ did not seek for visions of spiritual 
 beings, and like him also, he had from his earliest 
 age a profound faith in the Christian religion as he 
 then understood it. But unhke Boehme, he was of 
 
 »• The humility of both Boehme and Swedenborg, their entire 
 lack of intellectual pride, is a further point of resemblance well 
 worth noticing. 
 
78 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§42 
 
 an intellectual type of mind, a practical scientist and 
 
 a practical politician, with a European reputation 
 
 for his learnings Ardently he sought for the soul 
 
 analytically, hoping to discover it by physiological 
 
 investigations — until the vision came, and he laid 
 
 aside this work for a still higher calling. Other 
 
 seers have claimed to have experienced more or 
 
 less brief and fleeting visions of things spiritual : 
 
 Swedenborg asserts that his spiritual sight was 
 
 opened by God, and that he enjoyed constant 
 
 communication with the spiritual realm — with 
 
 devils as well as angels — during the space of many 
 
 years, whilst in full possession of those keen mental 
 
 powers which warrant us to say of him, that no 
 
 type of mind could be imagined better qualified to 
 
 see things in a right perspective. Together with 
 
 these '' outward *' visions came also the inward 
 
 spiritual enlightenment of his mind, whereby their 
 
 meaning became plain to him. Thus, in his 
 
 work on Heaven and its Wonders, and Hell, he 
 
 writes, ** . . . it has been granted me to associate 
 
 with angels and to talk with them as one man with 
 
 another ; and also to see what exists in the heavens 
 
 and in the hells, and this for thirteen years ; and 
 
 to describe them from the evidence of my own eyes 
 
 and ears in the hope that ignorance may be 
 
 enlightened, and unbehef dispelled.'' ^ Elsewhere 
 
 '0 Emanuel Swedenborg : Heaven and its Wonders, and Hell, 
 § I (edition in Everyman's Library, trans* by F. Bayley). 
 
§43] MYSTICISM 79 
 
 he says, ** ♦ ♦ ♦ the Lord manifested himself 
 before me his servant . ♦ . and afterwards opened 
 the sight of my spirit, and so let me into the 
 spiritual world, permitting me to see the heavens 
 and the hells, and also to converse with angels and 
 spirits, and this now continually for many years, 
 I attest in truth/' ^i And of the doctrines of the 
 New Church which was to be established — the 
 Church consisting in the mystic union of those who 
 worship the Lord God in spirit and truth, who 
 walk in the paths of righteousness, seeking, not for 
 self, but for the good of others — he writes in the 
 same place : ** I have never received anything 
 relating to the doctrines of that church from any 
 angel, but from the Lord alone, while I was read- 
 ing the Word/' Swedenborg most vividly realised 
 that momentous truth, which he so often explicitly 
 teaches, that all Good and all Truth are of God and 
 from God alone* No man can speak that which is 
 true, nor do that which is good, unless, in the very 
 widest and grandest meaning of the word, he is 
 inspired from the Divine Source of all good and 
 truth* 
 
 § 43. All systems of philosophy, as Professor Empiricism 
 
 and 
 ism 
 
 James pointed out, can be broadly divided into two ^^ Ra^ional- 
 
 " Emanuel Swedenborg : The True Christian Religion, 
 § 779« 
 
8o THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§43 
 
 groups, the rationalistic and the empiricaL The 
 term ** rationahstic ** is not, perhaps, a very happy 
 one, but it is here used to denote those systems 
 which are based upon ** principles ** and con- 
 structed by means of a priori reasoning, whereas 
 the empirical systems are those which are based 
 upon facts and constructed by means of a posteriori 
 reasoning. The former systems have generally 
 been associated with religion and what Professor 
 James calls ** tender-mindedness ** ; the latter 
 with irreligion and ** tough-mindedness/* But 
 as Professor James indicates, it were a good thing 
 if Religion and Empiricism could be combined. 
 This combination seems actually to have been 
 effected in the case of the mystics. 
 
 Superstition, § 44, Certainly, those systems of philosophy 
 Philosophy which attempt to evolve the whole Cosmos out of 
 EnfpSm bare thought, and give experience second place, 
 seem very unsatisfactory. But, on the other 
 hand, there is empiricism and empiricism. There 
 is an empiricism which just blindly accepts the 
 crude facts of experience, never trying to discover 
 the relations between them or to understand their 
 meanings. To some extent this criticism holds 
 good of what is called Common Sense. Common 
 Sense does, indeed, seek to generalise experience 
 
§44] MYSTICISM 8i 
 
 and to be guided by the results of such generalisa- 
 tions, but it does so hastily; and it may quite 
 easily degenerate into Superstition, Le*, the 
 supposition that events are connected which are 
 not connected in the manner supposed ♦ Thus, no 
 one, presumably, believes that to spill salt will 
 entail bad fortune, unless he has once observed 
 bad luck to follow the spilling of salt, or has it on 
 the authority of someone whose word he trusts, that 
 this has actually been observed. Consequently, 
 inasmuch as his superstitious belief is based upon 
 experience, he may be termed an empiricist. But 
 he is a very poor empiricist. Otherwise he would 
 interrogate experience again ; either by spilling salt 
 and observing the result in his o\vn case, or else by 
 carefully noting what happened when other persons 
 spilled salt. This is, indeed, just the difference 
 between the empiricism of common sense and 
 scientific empiricism : Science does not accept 
 experience at face value, but experiments, in order 
 to ehminate all adventitious elements, and to gain 
 a knowledge of the true relations between facts. 
 There is, moreover, a still higher form of empiri- 
 cism ; rational empiricism, if I may so call it — an 
 empiricism which has joined hands with rationalism 
 and become assimilated therewith. This, at least, 
 is what I understand by Philosophy : — an examina- 
 tion of experience in order to get at its Source, to 
 
82 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§44 
 
 \^ understand its purpose, in a word, to make plain its 
 Spiritual Meaning* 
 
 Mysticism § 45* Mysticism may be regarded, as I have 
 Empiricism suggested above, as empiricism applied to religious 
 experience. But it must be confessed that the 
 empiricism of the majority of mystics seems to be 
 largely that of the merely ** common sense ** order. 
 They accept the experiences vouchsafed to them 
 in thankfulness and wonder, but their very awe 
 and delight prevent them from examining such 
 experiences in a scientific and rational manner. 
 With Swedenborg, however, the case is different. 
 His early scientific and philosophical training en- 
 abled him coolly and critically to analyse his experi- 
 ences, and to bring to bear upon them his know- 
 ledge of scientific and philosophical method. This 
 coolness, this spirit of scientific detachment, 
 causes many readers to dislike his books ; but 
 philosophically considered, it is one of Sweden- 
 borg*s most valuable characteristics ; for it enabled 
 him, so it seems to me, to formulate for the first 
 time a philosophy of the spiritual, based not on 
 speculation, but on experience ; a system at once 
 empirical and rational. 
 
 > 
 
PART III 
 THE NATURE AND CRITERIA OF TRUTH 
 
\ 
 
 PART III 
 
 THE NATURE AND CRITERIA OF TRUTH 
 
 § 46. That which is, is true. Hence absolute Absolute 
 
 , 1 • • 1 • • • Truth Un- 
 
 truth, truth in Its entirety and unity, is coextensive knowable 
 
 with the whole of existence. To us who can per- 
 ceive only a part of things, who cannot altogether 
 escape from ourselves and see the whole Cosmos 
 as it is from every point of view at once, absolute 
 truth is unknown and unknowable. We can, with 
 an effort, bring ourselves sometimes to see things 
 from the view-point of others ; but we never 
 wholly succeed in this, because our sight is our 
 own ; and even were we to do so, we should still 
 be regarding things from an individual view-point. 
 The knowledge of absolute truth belongs to God 
 alone Who, immanent in all things, can perceive 
 all things from every point of view at once, and 
 as Cause of all things good (that is of all real exist- 
 ence, since evil exists only negatively, as a defect in, 
 or perversion of, that which otherwise is or would 
 be good) is the Fountain of all truth. Truth, then, 
 is the form of all real existence, that is, the mode of 
 manifestation of God. Put more briefly, it is the 
 form of good or love. 
 
 35 
 
86 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§46 
 
 Although we can never gain a knowledge of truth 
 in its entirety and unity, we may catch many 
 glimpses of its splendour, and just as a mathemati- 
 cal series may for ever progress towards some limit 
 which it never reaches, or just as a hyperbola on 
 production continually approaches but never 
 meets its asymptotes, so may we for ever progress 
 towards, but never gain, a knowledge of absolute 
 truth. We may, indeed, know truths relating to 
 the absolute, for all truths concerning truth are of 
 this nature ; but this is not the same thing as to 
 know absolute truth. 
 
 Mathematical § 47. As the notion of asymptotic approach 
 (i.)"converg- referred to above will probably be a new one to 
 cnt Series readers who have not studied mathematics, and 
 since it seems a very useful one in connection with 
 the question of man*s progress towards a know- 
 ledge of absolute truth, some further remarks on 
 it may not here be out of place. 
 
 Mathematics acquaints us with numerous series 
 of quantities — in which each term is formed from 
 the preceding by some fixed law or rule — which 
 possess this remarkable property : that by taking 
 a sufficient number of terms and adding them 
 together, we can obtain a quantity which shall 
 differ from a certain quantity, depending on the 
 nature of the series, by as httle as we please; but 
 
§ 48 ] THE NATURE OF TRUTH 87 
 
 however many terms we may take and add 
 together, the result will always fall short of this 
 latter quantity. Thus, considering the series as a 
 progression, its sum continually approaches, but 
 never actually coincides with, some fixed quantity 
 depending on the nature of the series. 
 
 Recurring decimals afford an example of such 
 series. Thus : — 
 
 •33~T(?o or s^^h^* ♦3333^TxfW(7 or f— ^uJ^n)* 
 
 and so on. Consequently, the more terms we 
 take of the recurring decimal .3, that is, of the 
 infinite series -^^ + y^^ + y/^xr + T<jh^ + . . . , 
 and add them together, the more nearly does the 
 ^ result approach |. But, however many terms we 
 take, their sum is never quite J : it is always just a 
 little less. 
 
 So may man's knowledge continually approach 
 to, but never reach, that of absolute truth. And 
 that this is necessary to his happiness is evident 
 from the fact that happiness is the product of felt 
 progress, and if progress terminate, however it may 
 terminate, happiness can no longer result. 
 
 § 48. It may be argued, however, that the Mathematical 
 series mentioned above is not really analogous to (""^Divw^* 
 man's progress in a knowledge of truth, because ^°^ ^®"^ 
 
88 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§48 
 
 each term is less than that preceding it, the rate of 
 the progress of the sum of the series being a 
 decreasing one ; whereas in the case of man's 
 knowledge of truth, the rate of progress is an 
 increasing one, each stage showing more truth 
 gained than during any preceding one of the same 
 duration* But this difference is because the goal 
 towards which man's knowledge of truth con- 
 tinually advances, but never reaches, is, not a 
 finite, but an infinite one. Now, all series in 
 which succeeding terms are greater than preceding 
 are divergent, i\e., there is no finite quantity which 
 their sum cannot be made to exceed by taking a 
 sufficient number of terms. Thus, consider the 
 series : — 
 
 I, 2, 4, 8, 16 ♦ ♦ • 
 
 By adding together a sufficient number of its terms, 
 each of which is twice that of the preceding, we can 
 obtain a quantity greater than any finite quantity 
 we please. Thus to exceed 100 we must take seven 
 terms, and to exceed 1000 we must take ten. But, 
 on the other hand, however many terms we do 
 take and add together, it is always possible to con- 
 ceive of a quantity greater than this result. Thus, 
 however many terms we do take, their sum is never 
 infinite. And the same statement holds good of 
 series in which each term is not merely twice that 
 
§ 49 ] THE NATURE OF TRUTH 89 
 
 of the preceding one, but even a hundred, a thou- 
 sand, or any finite number of times, as great. So 
 with man's knowledge of truth, it may for ever 
 increase, and its rate of increase may for ever 
 y^ increase, yet never does it become a knowledge of 
 absolute (Le., infinite) truth ♦ 
 
 § 49, A similar phenomenon of asymptotic Mathematical 
 
 1 • 1 •!_ V J t_ ^ • 1-1 Illustrations : 
 
 approach is exhibited by certain curves, which (jji.) The 
 
 progress according to fixed rules or laws. The Hyperbola 
 hyperbola (see page 91) is one of the simplest 
 cases. The hyperbola shown in the diagram is 
 constructed according to the following rule. Two 
 straight lines, which are to be the asymptotes of 
 the hyperbola, i.e., the lines which it continually 
 approaches, but never meets, are drawn at right 
 angles to one another. Let the point where they 
 cut be called ** O.*' Then, if any distance be 
 measured in inches from O along either asymptote, 
 the perpendicular distance of this point from the 
 hyperbola is, also measured in inches, the recipro- 
 cal ^ of the first measurement. Thus OM is 
 3 inches, PM is J inch. It is evident, therefore, 
 that the hyperbola will never meet its asymptotes, 
 
 » The reciprocal of a fraction is obtained by interchanging its 
 numerator and denominator. Thus, f (or i^) is the reciprocal 
 of f. All integral (or whole) numbers may be considered as 
 fractions with denominator i. Thus, 3 may be written ?, so 
 that its reciprocal is h* 
 
90 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§49 
 
 although by producing it, we can make it approach 
 as near to them as we please* Thus if we con- 
 tinued curve and asymptote 10 feet (==120 inches) 
 from O, the distance between the two would 
 be only t|^ inch* The two asymptotes may be 
 regarded as representing absolute truth, and the 
 hyperbola as man's gradual approximation thereto* 
 The analogy may be further extended if, adopting 
 a system of symbolism I suggested in A Mathemati-- 
 cal Theory of Spirit (19 12), we regard the horizontal 
 asymptote as representing the totality of natural 
 truth, the vertical asymptote as representing the 
 totality of spiritual truth. We may consider man's 
 knowledge as commencing at either vertex of the 
 hyperbola (V, V on page 91), the vertices being 
 the points which are furthest removed from the 
 asymptotes. In the case of a man who cultivates 
 a knowledge of both natural and spiritual truth, 
 I.e., the genuine philosopher, we may imagine his 
 consciousness as gradually flowing from V or V 
 along the hyperbola in both directions, though 
 possibly at different rates* But in the case of one 
 who concerned himself only with natural science, 
 the vertical flow would not take place* 
 
 All Natural § 50* All measurement involves some error, 
 DTOximate however accurately it may be carried out ; thus, if 
 one measures a distance with a ruler graduated 
 
 proximate 
 
*^aymptott 
 
 Asymptote. 
 
 HYPERBOLA /«iD ASYMPTOTES 
 (All measurements reduced §*) 
 
92 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§50 
 
 in hundredths of an inch, it is possible that the 
 measurement may be as much as five-thousandths 
 of an inch too great or too little ; and if one uses 
 some special instrument (e.g., a micrometer gauge), 
 which will give thousandths and even tenths of 
 thousandths of an inch correctly, the measurement 
 still falls short of absolute accuracy, and may be as 
 much as five hundredths of a thousandth of an 
 inch too great or too little^ So small a quantity as 
 this, of course, has no practical meaning, but it 
 certainly has a significance for the philosophy of 
 the Absolute. For if all measurement involves 
 error, be it only extremely slight, all natural laws 
 > which express the quantitative relations between 
 phenomena are approximate only, and thus fall 
 short of being absolutely true. As the degree of 
 approximation is improved, so the statement of 
 the law becomes more complex and more terms 
 are involved. Thus, take the law, partly dis- 
 covered by Boyle, partly by Gay-Lussac, concern- 
 ing the pressure, temperature and volume of a gas. 
 This law may be expressed by the formula — 
 
 PV=RT 
 
 — ^where P is the pressure, V the volume, T the 
 absolute temperature (i.e., temperature in degrees 
 Centigrade, plus 273° C), and R a constant quan- 
 tity. This law is very simple. It holds good with 
 
§ 51 ] THE NATURE OF TRUTH 93 
 
 fair accuracy of most gases, but of none is it 
 absolutely true. Van der WaaFs equation — 
 
 (P + v^.) (V - 6) == RT 
 
 — ^in which two new terms, a and b are introduced, 
 depending upon the nature of the gas, is more 
 accurate than the simpler equation PV=RT; 
 but even van der Waal's equation is no more than 
 an approximation, and of no gas does it hold with 
 absolute accuracy* No doubt a more accurate 
 equation could be obtained by introducing more 
 terms, and so on, ad infinitum. An equation repre- 
 senting the relation between any two phenomena 
 with absolute accuracy would involve infinite 
 terms, and thus the whole of existence. It appears, 
 therefore, that every fact involves something of the 
 infinite in it, and is thus not completely expHcable. 
 
 §51. Nor are the truths of Mathematics, as This State- 
 some think, exempt from the charge of being only xmc of the 
 approximations, and not absolute ; though, indeed, if^ °^ ^ 
 I freely admit that they are approximations of an 
 exceptionally high order of accuracy. There is, 
 for instance, as Riemann and Lobachewski have 
 shown, no logical reason why the sum of the three 
 angles of a triangle should be exactly equal to two 
 right angles ; for Euchd's proof of this proposition 
 is based upon a supposition as to the nature of 
 
94 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§51 
 
 . parallel straight lines which really assumes its 
 truth (see below, § 55)^ It is true, indeed, that 
 the most accurate measurements that have been 
 carried out have never shown any deviation of the 
 sum of the angles of a triangle from two right 
 angles ; so that for scientific purposes we should 
 treat Euclid's proposition as true.^ But for the 
 purposes of philosophical speculation it must be 
 remembered that a deviation of the sum of these 
 angles from two right angles may exist, though 
 smaller in magnitude than the smallest angular 
 differences that the most accurate instruments yet 
 constructed by man are capable of measuring* 
 
 All Know- § 52* It cannot be too strongly emphasised that 
 Truth Given every glimpse we have of truth is the gift of God, 
 ^Jnspira- £qj, since all truth is of and from God, truths become 
 man's only in virtue of Divine Revelation, whether 
 consciously perceived as such, or not* There can 
 be absolutely no knowledge of truth (whether 
 relating to the world of nature or to that of spirit) 
 which is not of this origin* Of course, I am using 
 the expression ** divine revelation ** in its widest 
 (and truest) sense, and not hmiting it to any special 
 experiences* For, accurately speaking, every ex- 
 perience that makes for goodness and truth is a 
 
 » Sec the Preface to the present writer's Experimental Mensura- 
 tion (Heinemann, 19x2)* 
 
§52] THE NATURE OF TRUTH 95 
 
 divine revelation* Rationality (or reason, if that 
 term is used in the wide meaning given to it in § 38, 
 as I intend doing in what follows) — rationality is 
 the inner ear God has given man whereby he may 
 hear His Voice ; and God speaks most eloquently 
 to man, both through nature, or the world of outer 
 experience, and through the heart, or world of 
 inner experience*^ 
 
 It follows, therefore, that the distinction between 
 revelation and discovery is largely a verbal one. 
 The two terms merely refer to the same process 
 regarded from different points of view : not (as is 
 commonly supposed) to two different processes 
 or modes in which man gains a knowledge of 
 truth. A truth to become man's must be given by 
 God and received by man ; it must, therefore, be 
 both revealed and discovered. That it must be 
 revealed has been shown already : that it must be 
 discovered is evident from the fact that no truth 
 can be known to man unless it be rationally apper- 
 ceived. A truth cannot carry a divine warrant 
 external to itself. Its rationality is its divine 
 warrant. If I am irrational I may judge it not to 
 be true ; but to an irrational person a knowledge of 
 
 ' I have not mentioned the Bible in the above passage as a 
 specific form of God's revelation to man, because the truths of 
 the Bible only become man's in virtue of that inner experience 
 which has already been mentioned. Something more will be 
 said on this point later. 
 
96 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§52 
 
 truth is not possible. Thus rationality or reason 
 is the sole criterion of truth : a statement is true 
 if it is rational; it is not true if it is irrationaL 
 
 Induction § 53, The criterion of rationality, however, 
 permits of discussion under three main heads, and 
 we may, therefore, speak of three criteria, any or 
 all of which (preferably all, where possible) may be 
 employed in judging of the truth of any statement : 
 the inductive, the deductive, and the pragmatic. 
 All three criteria involve the appeal to experience, 
 which, as the form of revelation, is, rationally 
 interpreted, the final test of truth. Induction, 
 however, is par excellence the appeal to experience, 
 that is, let it be repeated, to revelation from God, 
 Experience is the basis of discovery. We know, 
 . however, that experience is not free from error : 
 one's experiences reflect one's faults. This is in- 
 evitable, for man can observe things only through 
 his own senses and from one standpoint at once. 
 To obviate the errors thus arising in observations 
 relating to the physical realm, men of science 
 employ instruments to supplement and correct the 
 sense-impressions of the observer, and one experi- 
 ence is compared with another, so that the various 
 elements of error in each may be eliminated and 
 the common element of truth obtained. This is 
 the business of Science. 
 
 \ 
 
§54] THE NATURE OF TRUTH 97 
 
 We should commit a fatal error, however, if we 
 availed ourselves only of experience gained by 
 the outer senses : there is an inner experience of the 
 heart and mind, by which is revealed the true 
 spiritual significance of the symbols of which this 
 world consists* I mean the vision of the poet, 
 rather than the extraordinary experiences of the 
 psychic. As we have seen, the visions of the 
 psychic, though always of interest and importance 
 to the science of psychology, may be anything 
 other than spiritual. The vision of the poet, 
 which is spiritual vision, is free to all. Only it is 
 necessary that we clarify our inner sight by the 
 purification of our inner selves, lest we be misled 
 by the false visions of evil desires. 
 
 § 54. The spiritual message of the Bible is The Bible as 
 manifest to the inner sight, in so far as it is purified Truth'^^ ° 
 and educated to receive it. If the Bible were a 
 text-book of history or physical science it would be 
 right to apply to it the criteria of history or physical 
 science, which are inductive criteria based on 
 sensuous experience. But the Bible is of an 
 entirely different nature from this. It is of 
 spiritual import and meaning, and the inductive 
 criterion of the inner experience of the heart and 
 mind proclaims it to be the Word of God. That, 
 at least, is the unanimous testimony of the great 
 
 G 
 
98 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§54 
 
 Christian mystics* And Swedenborg's doctrine 
 of Correspondences, according to which every 
 natural object is the symbol of some spiritual 
 ^ verity to which it bears a functional analogy, 
 
 renders this view of the Bible the more sure. For 
 this doctrine makes plain the true structure of the 
 Bible, and explains its felt spiritual worth by show- 
 ing how, in the Bible, historical and other natural 
 ideas are utilised symbolically to express spiritual 
 and divine verities concerning God and the soul. 
 
 Deduction § 55* Deduction is the appeal to the principle 
 of the unity of Truth. Nothing can really be 
 discovered by deductive reasoning, for all that is 
 contained in the conclusion of a syllogism is 
 necessarily contained in its premises. In deduc- 
 tive reasoning the mind does not, as in inductive 
 reasoning, take a leap beyond what is given and 
 gain a higher vision and a more comprehensive 
 truth. The whole of Euclid's Geometry, for 
 example, is really contained in his fundamental 
 suppositions. But deduction does enable us to 
 behold a truth in all its fulness and beauty, to 
 behold within it depths undreamt of: were it 
 not for Euclid's deductive system of Geometry, 
 ^ who would dream one-half of what his funda- 
 mental suppositions contain i This is very near 
 akin to discovery* 
 
§ 56] THE NATURE OF TRUTH 99 
 
 Deduction enables us to compare a supposition 
 with a truth related to it, whereby, being sure of 
 the essential unity of truth, we may judge as to the 
 validity of this supposition according to its harmony 
 or disharmony with what we already know to be 
 true. Deduction, therefore, enables us to avail 
 ourselves of the results of the experience of others. 
 Valuable though one's own experience is to one- 
 self, and this is not less true in religion than in 
 other matters, man would never have progressed in 
 knowledge were it not for the fact that experience 
 and its results may be stored up, so to speak, in 
 tradition and in books, and handed on from 
 generation to generation. 
 
 § 56. A blind faith is no faith, whether in Faith and 
 Science or Religion. Man is a rational creature, *^ ^ 
 and in virtue of his rationality can see what is true. 
 The surest truth is not gained by argument but by 
 sight — spiritual or rational sight. ** Truth,** said 
 the mystic-poet Blake, ** can never be told so as to 
 be understood, and not be believ*d.** If this be 
 true, still more emphatically is it true that man 
 cannot be forced (as distinguished from rationally 
 led) into a knowledge of truth. A belief in certain 
 doctrines forced on the mind by means of miracles 
 or marvellous occurrences may be necessary in a 
 certain stage of man's intellectual evolution, but 
 
100 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§56 
 
 it does not result in that real knowledge of truth 
 which is essential to a true faith. It is good for 
 \ the child to learn everything from its own experi- 
 ence, as far as possible* But this is not completely 
 possible : there are certain facts which, for the 
 time being, it must accept on the authority of its 
 parents (miracle-workers in its sight) ♦ It cannot, 
 however, be said really to know these truths, unless, 
 and until, either it shall have experienced them for 
 itself, or the logical connection of these truths with 
 other facts of its experience shall have been made 
 plain ♦ Then its behef ceases to rest on authority, 
 and becomes grounded in the rational interpreta- 
 tion of experience* 
 
 Sweden- §57* The necessity of rational conviction for true 
 
 ttidl ^ "^" ^^^^^ ^^ ^ point much emphasised in the philosophy 
 of Swedenborg. And it was on this account that the 
 Swedish seer, although claiming to be in constant 
 communication with the spiritual world for many 
 years, disliked to give any outward sign of the 
 fact of this communication, lest it should force any 
 one to accept his doctrines without understanding 
 V them* For Swedenborg's philosophy and theology 
 are rational* It is this which so markedly distin- 
 guishes his system from those of others claiming 
 supernormal experiences, rendering it of so great 
 a significance for modern philosophy, whereas 
 
§ 58 ] THE NATURE OF TROTH* K)t 
 
 systems based on authority are of psyghpicgical; ,, 
 interest only« He was enabled* '16' apply "tlie" 
 rational (or scientific) method to experience of the 
 spiritual, and thus to place the philosophy of the 
 spiritual on a firm basis. And in virtue of the 
 correspondential relationship between matter and 
 spirit, the results of this experience could be 
 brought into relation with the results of the experi- 
 ence gained through contact with this world of 
 nature, and thus so expressed as to be rationally 
 apperceivable by those who are grounded in this 
 latter form of experience ♦ This does, indeed, 
 constitute a divine revelation, like every other 
 discovery, though truly of exceptional magnitude 
 and importance ♦ Whatever outward evidences* 
 there may be that Swedenborg*s claim is valid, the 
 final proof is to be found in the essential rationality 
 of the system he has propounded, in an irresistible 
 appeal to heart and mind. Beyond its rationality 
 it has no warrants, for to speak of a warrant trans- 
 cending the rationality of truth is to formulate a 
 contradiction in terms, 
 
 "§ 58. There is an old fallacy, according to which The Vnivet* 
 
 our reason, being finite, is unable to exercise judg- Rg^on^ 
 
 * For these evidences, which are very interesting and important 
 in their way, see the Appendices to E. F. Goerwitz's translation 
 of Kant's Dreams of a Spirit-Seer illustrated by Dreams of 
 Metaphysics, edited by Frank Sewall, 1900. 
 
loa THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§58 
 
 rmnt in matters relating to the infinite, and 
 whether or iiot ot 2ny use in deahng with purely 
 physical science, ought to be laid aside when we 
 come to religion. But if we are to lay reason aside 
 and submit to authority, which authority shall we 
 choose as that alone which will instruct us in right 
 knowledge S* Every sect claims authority, and if 
 one does so more loudly than the others, is that 
 any evidence of the validity of its claim $* But to 
 speak of reason as something individual and, there- 
 fore, defective, is to misunderstand the nature of 
 reason. Reason is everywhere one and the same. 
 It is not something which is the product of imper- 
 fect man : as we have seen, it is rather the gift of 
 God. To be reasonable is really to transcend 
 oneself ; it is to lay aside all that pertains to self in 
 the bad sense of this word ; to desire, not that this 
 theory shall be true and that false, but only that 
 truth may be gained. As John Locke says, ** He 
 that would acquit himself ♦ ♦ ♦ as a lover of truth, 
 not giving way to any preoccupation or bias that 
 may mislead him, must ♦ ♦ ♦ not be in love with 
 
 ^ any opinion, or wish it to be true, till he knows it to 
 be so, and then he will not need to wish it : for 
 
 \^ nothing that is false can deserve our good wishes, 
 nor a desire that it should have the place and force 
 of truth ; and yet nothing is more frequent than 
 
§ 59] THE NATURE OF TRUTH 103 
 
 this/* • Thus, to be truly reasonable is to lay aside 
 self-desire, and to listen to the Voice of God* 
 
 § 59* We do not, indeed, get truth out of the The True 
 crude facts of experience. They are only appear- aS^thc fTisc 
 ances* And as Swedenborg remarks ** ♦ ♦ ♦ to 
 think from the influx of natural l^ht not en- 
 lightened by the influx of spiritual hght is merely 
 to dream, and to speak from such thought is to 
 make vain assertions like fortune-tellers/* * But 
 in so far as we rationally study such appearances, 
 seeking to gain the truth underlying them, in so 
 far do we permit a divine influx of truth into our 
 minds. We may be content to stock our minds 
 with mere memory-knowledges of facts ; but if we 
 seek to understand and utilise the relations between 
 these facts, we allow the influx of a higher order 
 of ideas into our minds ; and we receive ideas of a 
 still higher order when we endeavour rationally 
 to discover the spiritual significance — the purpose 
 and cause — of such facts. On the other hand, in 
 so far as we deny right reason, and rely upon 
 external authority, in so far do we shut out the 
 spiritual light. The crude facts of experience are, 
 as it were, the symbols employed in a magic 
 
 • John Locke : Of the Conduct of the Understanding, §§ x. and 
 xi. (edited by Thomas Fowler, D.D., 1901). 
 
 • Emanuel Swedenborg : The Intercourse of the Soul and the 
 Body, § xiv. 8 (trans, by John Presland, 1897). 
 
104 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§59 
 
 ritual whereby Truth manifests herself to our 
 spiritual sight. But, to continue the figure, these 
 symbols may be used either for white magic or for 
 black : by means of the appearances of nature we 
 can confirm ourselves either in those doctrines 
 which are true or in those doctrines which are 
 false, according to whether the spiritual hght which 
 alone can enlighten natural experience is received 
 or rejected. The same holds good of the words of 
 Holy Writ, if , as I believe, the mystical view of 
 both Nature and the Bible (as developed by 
 Swedenborg) be valid. One who studies the Bible 
 in its merely literal sense, seeking for no meanings 
 beyond those of ** the letter which killeth," may 
 not only confirm himself in stupid doctrines, e.g., 
 that the world was created in seven days, but in 
 immoral ones, e.g., that God is vengeful ; just as 
 a person, who blindly accepts natural facts without 
 examining them scientifically, may confirm himself 
 in foolish superstitions (see § 44), or as one, who 
 fails to take a truly philosophical view of nature, 
 may confirm himself in the belief that nature is the 
 cause and origin of all things, and that there is no 
 God. It is quite otherwise, however, with those 
 who are truly rational. 
 
 Pragmatism § 60. There is another criterion of truth to be 
 considered — the pragmatic. This is the appeal 
 
§ 6o J THE NATURE OF TRUTH 105 
 
 to the essential goodness of truth. To the Greek 
 thinkers it seemed natural to conclude that Good- 
 ness, Truth and Beauty are essentially one ; but 
 the tendency of nineteenth-century pessimistic 
 philosophy was to separate these elements of 
 fundamental reality, and to set them against one 
 another. But this attitude is generally associated 
 with that spurious realism which pbces an im- 
 penetrable wall between our ideas and reahty, and 
 renders true knowledge impossible, or, at least, 
 renders any criterion of it impossible. Pragma- 
 tism, which regards '* true ** as connoting, not less 
 than ** good,*' that which is useful, indicates a 
 tendency towards the older, and I think, more 
 valid, point of view. But before we can accept the 
 pragmatic definition of truth as that which **works,*' , 
 we must first settle the question ** to what end ^ ** 
 Statements which serve for the purposes of daily 
 life,' and are, therefore, pragmatically true, will 
 not serve for the purposes of more exact science,^ 
 and are, therefore, pragmatically false. Um- 
 versality here appears to be the needed criterion. 
 The statements of science will serve for the pur- 
 poses of daily life, though no doubt more cumber- 
 some, because more exact, than the common state- 
 ments usually employed for such purposes. But 
 
 ' For example, the statements that the sun rises, that water 
 boils at 212° F., etc. 
 
io6 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§6o 
 
 these latter statements are valid only within their 
 own sphere* Hence they are less near approxima- 
 tions to absolute truth than are the statements of 
 science. 
 
 The need for defining the end by means of which 
 truth may be pragmatically judged is the more 
 necessary in the sphere of Ethics. What a man 
 considers as his good, may involve the reverse of 
 good to the rest of humanity. Hence, what a man 
 might pragmatically judge to be morally true, 
 might for the rest of humanity be, again prag- 
 matically considered, morally false. Here again 
 universality seems to be the needed criterion, and if 
 we define the good of an individual as that which 
 ministers to the happiness of the whole of humanity, 
 or as many members of it as may be concerned, 
 then we may, I think, apply the pragmatic criterion 
 to moral truth. 
 
 The Unity of §61. As Swedenborg so well teaches, divine 
 and Tnith ^ove and truth, though separable in thought, make 
 one in actuality, as do their most adequate symbols, 
 the heat and light of the sun. That which is 
 really true is good ; that which is genuinely good 
 is true. Falsity cannot result in genuine good, 
 nor truth in other than merely temporary (and 
 therefore, only apparent) evil. 
 Truth is more than a matter of mere knowledge ; 
 
§ 6i ] THE NATURE OF TRUTH 107 
 
 it is something to be lived, not merely to be known. 
 Truths do not really become a man's until he makes 
 them part and parcel of his very being, ** Faith 
 without works is dead/' A living faith is the 
 perception of truth combined with a life lived in 
 accordance with its dictates. It is truth in the will 
 as well as in the understanding. If a man's prin- 
 ciples do not result in a good — that is, a genuinely 
 altruistic — life, then, either these principles are not 
 really the man's, or else they are not true. Thus 
 we may judge of the truth of any principle : if 
 really lived, does it result in good ^ Of course, 
 every truth cannot be judged in this way, but only 
 such as may sufficiently affect a man's actions for 
 their effects to be observable. Moreover, in using 
 this pragmatic criterion it is, of course, absolutely 
 necessary that our ideas as to what is good, and 
 what is evil, are valid : no standard may be set up 
 which involves anything of self-love as an end, else 
 truth will appear erroneous and error true. 
 
 To sum up : man has the power of seeing truth 
 when presented to him in a manner harmonious 
 with his stage of intellectual development. He is 
 taught truth largely through his own experience. 
 He may avail himself of the experiences of others 
 which bear a relation to his own sufficiently near 
 for him to perceive it. And, further, he may judge 
 of the truth of principles according to whether they 
 
io8 THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§6i 
 
 make for good or evil. Thus, all truth is gained 
 through the rational interpretation of experience, 
 which is revealed by God and discovered by man. 
 
 Conclusion § 62. To conclude this brief, but I hope not 
 altogether inadequate, contribution to a subject 
 of no little difficulty, I shall quote the follow- 
 ing beautiful passage from Swedenborg. It has 
 reference to the state of those beatified souls who 
 are termed by him the ** celestial angels,** and who 
 are wholly united to (though not absorbed in) God, 
 in virtue of a perception of their utter dependency 
 upon Him for all the truth that they know and the 
 good that they effect* They are in full conscious 
 possession and use of that power which I have 
 termed ** intuition ** or the ** sight of the soul,** a 
 power which bears fruit in exact proportion to the 
 degree of divine union (or moral purification) to 
 which the soul has attained. '* Divine truths,** 
 says Swedenborg, ** appear, as it were, inscribed on 
 [the celestial] angels* minds, or as if they were im- 
 planted and innate in them ; and therefore as soon 
 as they hear genuine Divine truths they immedi- 
 ately perceive, acknowledge and afterwards see 
 them, as it were, within themselves. For the 
 angels of the third [i.e., celestial] heaven never 
 reason about Divine truths, still less do they dis- 
 pute about the genuineness of any truth ; nor do 
 
§62] THE NATURE OF TRUTH 109 
 
 they know what it is to believe or to have faith ; 
 for they say, * What is faith i I perceive and see 
 that the fact is so/ They illustrate this by com- 
 parisons ; for example, it would be as if any one 
 should see a house and the various things in and 
 around it, and should say to his companion that he 
 must believe that these things exist, and that they 
 are such as he sees them to be : or as if any one 
 should see a garden with its trees and fruit, and 
 should say to his companion that he ought to have 
 faith that there is a garden, and that there are trees 
 and fruit, whereas he sees them plainly with his 
 eyes. Hence it is that those angels never mention 
 faith, nor have they any idea of it ; neither do they 
 reason about Divine truths, still less dispute con- 
 cerning the genuineness of any truth. But the 
 angels of the first or lowest heaven have not Divine 
 truths thus inscribed on their minds, because with 
 them only the first degree of life is open ; therefore 
 they reason concerning truths, and those who 
 reason see scarcely anything beyond the immediate 
 object about which they reason, or travel beyond 
 the subject, except to confirm it in certain respects ; 
 and when they have confirmed it, they say it is a 
 matter of faith, and that it ought to be believed. I 
 have spoken with angels on these subjects and they 
 told me that the distinction between the wisdom of 
 the angeb of the third heaven and that of the angels 
 
no THE MAGIC OF EXPERIENCE [§62 
 
 of the first heaven is like that between what is clear 
 and what is obscure ♦ They also compared the 
 wisdom of the angels of the third heaven to a 
 magnificent palace full of all kinds of useful things, 
 around which are gardens on all sides, bordered 
 by magnificent objects of many kinds ; and those 
 angels, since they are in the truths of wisdom, can 
 enter into the palace, and see everything, and also 
 walk in the gardens in every direction and take 
 delight in every thing. But it is different with 
 those who reason concerning truths, and especially 
 with those who dispute about them; for they 
 do not see truths in the light of truth, but either 
 accept them on the authority of others, or take 
 them from the literal sense of the Word, which they 
 do not clearly understand ; and therefore, having 
 no desire to possess any inward perception of the 
 truth, they say that truths ought to be believed and 
 that faith is to be exercised on them. Of these, the 
 angels said that they cannot approach the first 
 threshold of the palace of wisdom, much less enter 
 it and walk about in its gardens, because they stop 
 at the first step. It is different with those who are 
 imbued with the very truths themselves ; nothing 
 retards their unlimited progress, because truths 
 which are seen to be true guide them wherever 
 they go, and lead them forth into wide fields, 
 since every truth is of infinite extent and is 
 
§62] THE NATURE OF TRUTH iii 
 
 in close connexion with a multitude of other 
 truths, 
 
 ** They said, further, that the wisdom of the 
 angels of the inmost heaven consists principally in 
 this, that in every object they see Divine and 
 heavenly things, and in a series of several objects 
 they see still more wonderful things, for everything 
 they see has a correspondence ♦ When they see 
 palaces and gardens their view is not arrested by 
 these visible objects but penetrates to the interior 
 truths whose outward expression they are and to 
 which therefore they correspond ; and all this 
 takes place with infinite variety according to the 
 appearance of the objects ; thus they obtain a com- 
 prehensive view of innumerable things in an 
 orderly connexion, and this so affects their minds 
 that they seem to be transported with delight/* ® 
 It is this state of mind, I conceive, to which the 
 true philosopher ought to aspire. 
 
 * Emanuel Swedenborg : Heaven and its Wonders, and Hell, 
 §270 (edition in Everyman*s Library, trans* by F. Bayley). 
 It should be noted that Swedenborg uses the word ** reason *' 
 above in the sense of mere ** ratiocination,** not with the wider 
 meaning with which I have employed it in this book. The 
 three heavens of which he speaks are not, according to him, 
 situated in space, but are the objectifications of different states 
 or discrete degrees of mind* 
 
 THE END 
 
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