Nature Mysticism | Page 7

But the scope of knowledge in
the fullest sense is indefinitely greater than that of science and
philosophy.
Nor is it hard to see why the sphere of reflective thought is thus
comparatively limited. For modern speculations, and even the straitest
psychology, have familiarised us with the idea of a larger self that is
beyond the reach of conscious analysis. Obscure workings of the
mind--emotions, moods, immediate perceptions, premonitions, and the
rest--have a potent part to play in the actual living of a life. Consider in
this connection such a passage as the following, taken from Jefferies'
"Story of My Heart." It means something, though it is not scientific.
"Three things only have been discovered of that which concerns the
inner consciousness since before written history began. Three things
only in twelve thousand written, or sculptured years, and in the dumb,
dim time before them. Three ideas the cavemen wrested from the
unknown, the night which is round us still in daylight--the existence of
the soul, immortality, the deity. These things . . . do not suffice me. I
desire to advance farther, and to wrest a fourth, and even still more than
a fourth, from the darkness of thought. I want more ideas of
soul-life. . . . My naked mind confronts the unknown. I see as clearly as
the noonday that this is not all; I see other and higher conditions than
existence; I see not only the existence of the soul, but, in addition, I
realise a soul-life illimitable. . . . I strive to give utterance to a Fourth
Idea. The very idea that there is another idea is something gained. The
three gained by the cavemen are but stepping-stones, first links of an
endless chain."
Of course, we are here reminded of Wordsworth's "obstinate
questionings of sense and outward things"; of his "misgivings of a
creature moving about in worlds not realised." Intuition is feeling its
way outwards beyond the sphere of the known, and emotion is working
in harmony with it, the reason still fails to grip. Morris' description of a
like sense of unrealised possibilities applies, in varying degrees, to men

of all sorts and conditions, though the poets of whom he speaks are the
most favoured.
"Blind thoughts which occupy the brain, Dumb melodies which fill the
ear, Dim perturbations, precious pain, A gleam of hope, a chill of fear--
These seize the poet's soul, and mould The ore of fancy into gold."
Language is thus employed to proclaim its own inadequacy. And who
can fail to see that between the rich complexity of the workings of the
whole mind and the means by which we would fain render them
articulate, there yawns a gap which no effort can bridge over? Even the
poet fails--much more the scientist! To refuse to take cognisance of the
fresh spontaneity of feeling and intuition is to rob life of its higher joys
and its deeper meanings.
CHAPTER IV
MAN AND NATURE
Many thinkers of the present day pride themselves upon the growth of
what they call the naturalistic spirit. What do they mean by this? They
mean that the older ways of interpreting nature, animistic or
supernatural, are being supplanted by explanations founded on
knowledge of physical facts and "natural" laws. And, up to a point,
there are but few natural mystics who will not concur in their feelings
of satisfaction that ignorance and superstition are disappearing in rough
proportion as exact knowledge advances. At any rate, in this study, the
more solid conclusions of science will be freely and gladly accepted.
The very idea of a conflict between Science and Natural Mysticism is
to be mercilessly scouted.
But this concurrence must be conditional. Tait, for example, was
scornful of any form of animism. He wrote thus: "The Pygmalions of
modern days do not require to beseech Aphrodite to animate the world
for them. Like the savage with his Totem, they have themselves already
attributed life to it. 'It comes,' as Helmholtz says, 'to the same thing as
Schopenhauer's metaphysics. The stars are to love and hate one another,
feel pleasure and displeasure, and to try to move in a way

corresponding to these feelings.' The latest phase of this peculiar
non-science tells us that all matter is alive; or at least that it contains the
'promise and potency' (whatever these may be) 'of all terrestrial life.'
All this probably originated in the very simple manner already hinted at;
viz., in the confusion of terms constructed for application to thinking
beings only, with others applicable only to brute matter, and a blind
following of this confusion to its necessarily preposterous
consequences. So much for the attempts to introduce into science an
element altogether incompatible with the fundamental conditions of its
existence."
This is vigorous! But how does