deals. They have been mainly practical mystics, such as
William Law. Those of the poets who have consciously had a system and
desired to impart it, have done so from the practical point of view,
urging, like Wordsworth, the importance of contemplation and meditation,
or, like Blake, the value of cultivating the imagination; and in both
cases enforcing the necessity of cleansing the inner life, if we are to
become conscious of our divine nature and our great heritage.

For the sake of clearness, this thought may first be traced very briefly
as it appears chronologically; it will, however, be considered in
detail, not in order of time, but according to the special aspect of
Being through which the writer felt most in touch with the divine life.
For mystics, unlike other thinkers, scientific or philosophical, have
little chronological development, since "mystic truths can neither age
nor die." So much is this the case that passages of Plotinus and
Tennyson, of Boehme and Law, of Eckhart and Browning, may be placed side
by side and be scarcely distinguishable in thought. Yet as the race
evolves, certain avenues of sensation seem to become more widely opened
up. This is noticeable with regard to Nature. Love, Beauty, Wisdom, and
Devotion, these have been well-trodden paths to the One ever since the
days of Plato and Plotinus; but, with the great exception of St Francis
of Assisi and his immediate followers, we have to wait for more modern
times before we find the intense feeling of the Divinity in Nature which
we associate with the name of Wordsworth. It is in the emphasis of this
aspect of the mystic vision that English writers are supreme. Henry
Vaughan, Wordsworth, Browning, Richard Jefferies, Francis Thompson, and
a host of other poet-seers have crystallised in immortal words this
illuminated vision of the world.

The thought which has been described as mystical has its roots in the
East, in the great Oriental religions. The mysterious "secret" taught by
the Upanishads is that the soul or spiritual consciousness is the only
source of true knowledge. The Hindu calls the soul the "seer" or the
"knower," and thinks of it as a great eye in the centre of his being,
which, if he concentrates his attention upon it, is able to look
outwards and to gaze upon Reality. The soul is capable of this because
in essence it is one with Brahman, the universal soul. The apparent
separation is an illusion wrought by matter. Hence, to the Hi