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Mysticism, by Evelyn Underhill, [1911], at sacred-texts.com[i][i-p0.1]Mysticism: [i-p0.2]A Study in Nature and Development of Spiritual Consciousness [i-p0.3]by [i-p0.4]Evelyn UnderhillMysticism, by Evelyn Underhill, [1911], at sacred-texts.com[i_1][i_1-p0.1]PREFACE TO THE TWELFTH EDITION[i_1-p1] [i_1-p1.1]Since this book first appeared, nineteen years ago, the studyof mysticism--not only in England, but also in France, Germany and Italy--hasbeen almost completely transformed. From being regarded, whether critically orfavourably, as a byway of religion, it is now more and more generally accepted bytheologians, philosophers and psychologists, as representing in its intensiveform the essential religious experience of man. The labours of a generation ofreligious psychologists--following, and to some extent superseding the pioneerwork of William James--have already done much to disentangle its substance fromthe psycho-physical accidents which often accompany mystical apprehension. Whilstwe are less eager than our predecessors to dismiss all accounts of abnormalexperience as the fruit of superstition or disease, no responsible student nowidentifies the mystic and the ecstatic; or looks upon visionary and other"extraordinary phenomena" as either guaranteeing or discrediting the witness ofthe mystical saints. Even the remorseless explorations and destructive criticismsof the psycho-analytic school are now seen to have effected a useful work;throwing into relief the genuine spiritual activities of the psyche, whileexplaining in a naturalistic sense some of their less fortunate psycho-physicalaccompaniments. The philosophic and theological landscape also, with itsincreasing emphasis on Transcendence, its new friendliness to the concept of theSupernatural, is becoming ever more favourable to the metaphysical claims of themystics. On one hand the prompt welcome given to the work of Rudolf Otto and KarlBarth, on the other the renewed interest in Thomist philosophy, seem to indicatea growing recognition of the distinctness and independence of the SpiritualOrder. and a revival [p. xiv] [i_1-Page_xiv] of the creaturely sense, stronglycontrasting with the temper of late nineteenth-century thought.[i_1-p2]Were I, then, now planning this book for the first time, its argumentswould be differently stated. More emphasis would be given (a) to the concrete,richly living yet unchanging character of the Reality over against the mystic, asthe first term, cause and incentive of his experience; (b) to that paradox ofutter contrast yet profound relation between the Creator and the creature, Godand the soul, which makes possible his development; (c) to the predominant part
 
played in that development by the free and prevenient action of theSupernatural--in theological language, by "grace"--as against all merelyevolutionary or emergent theories of spiritual transcendence. I feel more andmore that no psychological or evolutionary treatment of man's spiritual historycan be adequate which ignores the element of "given-ness" in all genuine mysticalknowledge. Though the mystic Life means organic growth, its first term must besought in ontology; in the Vision of the Principle, as St. Gregory the Greattaught long ago. For the real sanction of that life does not inhere in thefugitive experiences or even the transformed personality of the subject; but inthe metaphysical Object which that subject apprehends.[i_1-p3]Again, it now seems to me that a critical realism, which found room forthe duality of our full human experience--the Eternal and the Successive,supernatural and natural reality--would provide a better philosophic backgroundto the experience of the mystics than the vitalism which appeared, twenty yearsago, to offer so promising a way of escape from scientific determinism.Determinism--more and more abandoned by its old friends the physicists--is nolonger the chief enemy to such a spiritual interpretation of life as is requiredby the experience of the mystics. It is rather a naturalistic monism, a shallowdoctrine of immanence unbalanced by any adequate sense of transcendence, whichnow threatens to re-model theology in a sense which leaves no room for thenoblest and purest reaches of the spiritual life.[i_1-p4]Yet in spite of the adjustments required by such a shifting at thephilosophic outlook, and by nearly twenty years of further [p. xv] [i_1-Page_xv]study and meditation, the final positions which seem to me to be required by theexistence of mysticism remain substantially unchanged. Twenty years ago, I wasalready convinced that the facts of man's spiritual experience pointed to alimited dualism; a diagram which found place for his contrasting apprehension ofAbsolute and Contingent, Being and Becoming, Simultaneous and Successive.Further, that these facts involved the existence in him too of a certaindoubleness, a higher and lower, natural and transcendental self--somethingequivalent to that "Funklein" spark, or apex of the soul on which the mysticshave always insisted as the instrument of their special experience. Both theseopinions were then unpopular. The second, in particular, has been severelycriticized by Professor Pratt and other authorities on the psychology ofreligion. Yet the constructive work which has since been done on the metaphysicalimplications of mystical experience has tended more and more to establish theirnecessity, at least as a basis of analysis; and they can now claim the mostdistinguished support.[i_1-p5]The recovery of the concept of the Supernatural--a word which norespectable theologian of the last generation cared to use--is closely linkedwith the great name of Friedrich von Hugel. His persistent opposition to allmerely monistic, pantheist and immanental philosophies of religion, and hisinsistence on the need of a "two-step diagram" of the Reality accessible to man,though little heeded in his life-time, are now bearing fruit. This re-instatementof the Transcendent, the "Wholly Other," as the religious fact, is perhapsthe most fundamental of the philosophic changes which have directly affected thestudy of mysticism. It thus obtains a metaphysical background which harmonizeswith its greatest declarations, and supports its claim to empirical knowledge ofthe Truth on which all religion rests. Closely connected with the transcendenceof its Object, are the twin doctrines emphasized in all Von Hugel's work. First,that while mysticism is an essential element in full human religion, it can neverbe the whole content of such religion. It requires to be embodied in some degreein history, dogma and institutions if it is to reach the sense-conditioned humanmind. Secondly, that the antithesis between the religions of "authority" and of[p. xvi] [i_1-Page_xvi] "spirit," the "Church" and the "mystic," is false. Each
 
requires the other. The "exclusive" mystic, who condemns all outward forms andrejects the support of the religious complex, is an abnormality. He inevitablytends towards pantheism, and seldom exhibits in its richness the Unitive Life. Itis the "inclusive" mystic, whose freedom and originality are fed but not hamperedby the spiritual tradition within which he appears, who accepts theincarnational status of the human spirit, and can "find the inward in the outwardas well as the inward in the inward," who shows us in their fullness and beautythe life-giving possibilities of the soul transfigured in God.[i_1-p6]Second in importance among the changes which have come over the study ofmysticism, I should reckon the work done during the last decade upon thepsychology of prayer and contemplation. I cannot comment here upon the highlytechnical discussions between experts as to the place where the line is to bedrawn between "natural" and "supernatural," "active" and "infused" operations ofthe soul in communion with God; or the exact distinction between "ordinary" and"extraordinary" contemplation. But the fact that these discussions have takenplace is itself significant; and requires from religious psychology theacknowledgement of a genuine two-foldness in human nature--the difference in kindbetween Animus the surface-self and Anima the transcendental self, intouch with supernatural realities. Here, the most important work has been done inFrance; and especially by the Abbe Bremond, whose "Priere et Poesie" and"Introduction a la Philosophie de la Priere"--based on a vast acquaintance withmystical literature--mark, I believe, the beginning of a new understanding ofthe character of contemplation. The Thomist philosophy of Maritain, and thepsychological researches of Marechal, tend to support this developing view of themystical experience, even in its elementary forms, as an activity of thetranscendental self; genuinely supernatural, yet not necessarily involving anyabnormal manifestations, and linked by the ascending "degrees of prayer" withthe subject's "ordinary" religious life. This disentangling of the substance ofmysticism from the psycho-physical accidents of trance, ecstasy, vision and otherabnormal phenomena which often [p. xvii] [i_1-Page_xvii] accompany it, and itsvindication as something which gives the self a genuine knowledge oftranscendental Reality--with its accompanying demonstration of the soberness andsanity of the greatest contemplative saints--is the last of the beneficentchanges which have transformed our study of the mystics. In this country it isidentified with the work of two Benedictine scholars; Abbot Chapman of Downsideand Dom Cuthbert Butler, whose "Western Mysticism" is a masterly exhibition ofthe religious and psychological normality of the Christian contemplative life, asdeveloped by its noblest representatives.[i_1-p7]Since this book was written, our knowledge of the mystics has been muchextended by the appearance of critical texts of many writings which had only beenknown to us in garbled versions; or in translations made with an eye toedification rather than accuracy. Thus the publication of the authenticrevelations of Angela of Foligno--one of the most interesting discoveries ofrecent years--has disclosed the unsuspected splendour of her mysticalexperience. The critical texts of St. Teresa and St. John of the Cross which arenow available amend previous versions in many important respects. We havereliable editions of Tauler and Ruysbroeck; of "The Cloud of Unknowing," and ofWalter Hilton's works. The renewed interest in seventeenth-century mysticism, duein part to the Abbe Bremond's great work, has resulted in the publication ofmany of its documents. So too the literary, social and historical links betweenthe mystics, the influence of environment, the great part played by forgottenspiritual movements and inarticulate saints, are beginning to be betterunderstood. Advantage has been taken of these facts in preparing the presentedition. All quotations from the mystics have been revised by comparison with thebest available texts. The increased size of the historical appendix andbibliography is some indication of the mass of fresh material which is now at the
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