in fact an exact description of the way in which the
spiritual consciousness--the supernatural urge--is observed to spread in
human society. It is characteristic of the regenerate type, that he
should as it were overflow his own boundaries and energize other souls:
for the gift of a real and harmonized life pours out inevitably from
those who possess it to other men. We notice that the great mystics
recognize again and again such a fertilizing and creative power, as a
mark of the soul's full vitality. It is not the personal rapture of the
spiritual marriage, but rather the "divine fecundity" of one who is a
parent of spiritual children; which seems to them the goal of human
transcendence, and evidence of a life truly lived on eternal levels, in
real union with God. "In the fourth and last degree of love the soul
brings forth its children," says Richard of St. Victor.[53] "The last
perfection to supervene upon a thing," says Aquinas, "is its becoming
the cause of other things."[54] In a word, it is creative. And the
spiritual life as we see it in history is thus creative; the cause of
other things.

History is full of examples of this law: that the man or woman of the
spirit is, fundamentally, a life-giver; and all corporate achievement of
the life of the spirit flows from some great apostle or initiator, is
the fruit of discipleship. Such corporate achievement is a form of group
consciousness, brought into being through the power and attraction of a
fully harmonized life, infecting others with its own sharp sense of
Divine reality. Poets and artists thus infect in a measure all those
who yield to their influence. The active mystic, who is the poet of
Eternal Life, does it in a supreme degree. Such a relation of master and
disciples is conspicuous in every true spiritual revival; and is the
link between the personal and corporate aspects of regeneration. We see
it in the little flock that followed Christ, the Little Poor Men who
followed Francis, the Friends of Fox, the army of General Booth. Not
Christianity alone, but Hindu and Moslem history testify to this
necessity. The Hindu who is drawn to the spiritual life must find a
_guru_ who can not only teach its laws but also give its atmosphere; and
must accept his discipline in a spirit of obedience. The S[=u]fi
neophyte is directed to place himself in the hands of his _sheikh_ "as a
corpse in the hands of the washer"; and all the great saints of Islam
have been the ins