THE REAWAKENING OF MYSTICISM
The Reawakening of Mysticism
George H. Morrison
At a period not far distant from the present, and well within the memory of some of us, it was the fashion to decry all truth that was not reached by the action of the intellect. The only interpretation reckoned valid was the intellectual interpretation; the only methods which were regarded seriously were the logical and scientific methods; the only truths deemed worthy of acceptance were such as were capable of comprehension, and could be verified by scientific processes.
For this insistence on the comprehensible there were reasons which are readily apparent. There was that wonderful awakening of the intellect that marked the nineteenth century in England. There were those marvelous discoveries of science which gave to science a certain lordly arrogance, as if there were no truths she could not come by, and no secrets which she could not penetrate. All that was only a little while ago, and yet one is conscious of a subtle change today. The sense of the mystery which broods on things is far more vivid than thirty years ago. Men are awakening as to haunting presences which are ever near us, yet eluding us; they feel that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our philosophy. There is a growing belief that in the universe are secrets which are not intellectual at all. There is a strengthening trust in the verdict of the feelings, and in the illumination of the will. There is a deepening sense that all that is most real can never be demonstrated by any logic, but must be felt, where argument is hushed, in the silence and shadow of the soul. Now this new attitude of men and women is what may be called the attitude of mysticism. He who feels so, although he may not know it, has been touched by the flaming of the mystic torch. And it is on that mysticism, and the gains of it, in the peculiar circumstances of the hour, that I wish to speak a word or two tonight.
Taken in its most general s ...
George H. Morrison
At a period not far distant from the present, and well within the memory of some of us, it was the fashion to decry all truth that was not reached by the action of the intellect. The only interpretation reckoned valid was the intellectual interpretation; the only methods which were regarded seriously were the logical and scientific methods; the only truths deemed worthy of acceptance were such as were capable of comprehension, and could be verified by scientific processes.
For this insistence on the comprehensible there were reasons which are readily apparent. There was that wonderful awakening of the intellect that marked the nineteenth century in England. There were those marvelous discoveries of science which gave to science a certain lordly arrogance, as if there were no truths she could not come by, and no secrets which she could not penetrate. All that was only a little while ago, and yet one is conscious of a subtle change today. The sense of the mystery which broods on things is far more vivid than thirty years ago. Men are awakening as to haunting presences which are ever near us, yet eluding us; they feel that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our philosophy. There is a growing belief that in the universe are secrets which are not intellectual at all. There is a strengthening trust in the verdict of the feelings, and in the illumination of the will. There is a deepening sense that all that is most real can never be demonstrated by any logic, but must be felt, where argument is hushed, in the silence and shadow of the soul. Now this new attitude of men and women is what may be called the attitude of mysticism. He who feels so, although he may not know it, has been touched by the flaming of the mystic torch. And it is on that mysticism, and the gains of it, in the peculiar circumstances of the hour, that I wish to speak a word or two tonight.
Taken in its most general s ...
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