both live and move and have their being. Mr. Vaughan's object,
however, has not been to work out in his book such problems as these.
Had he done so, he would have made his readers understand better what
Mysticism is; he would have avoided several hasty epithets, by the
use of which he has, we think, deceived himself into the notion that
he has settled a matter by calling it a hard name; he would have
explained, perhaps, to himself and to us, many strange and seemingly
contradictory facts in the annals of Mysticism. But he would also
not have written so readable a book. On the whole he has taken the
right course, though one wishes that he had carried it out more
methodically.

A few friends, literate and comfortable men, and right-hearted
Christians withal, meet together to talk over these same mystics, and
to read papers and extracts which will give a general notion of the
subject from the earliest historic times. The gentlemen talk about
and about a little too much; they are a little too fond of
illustrations of the popular pulpit style; they are often apt to say
each his say, with very little care of what the previous speaker has
uttered; in fact these conversations are, as conversations, not good,
but as centres of thought they are excellent. There is not a page
nor a paragraph in which there is not something well worth
recollecting, and often reflections very wise and weighty indeed,
which show that whether or not Mr. Vaughan has thoroughly grasped the
subject of Mysticism, he has grasped and made part of his own mind
and heart many things far more practically important than Mysticism,
or any other form of thought; and no one ought to rise up from the
perusal of his book without finding himself if not a better, at least
a more thoughtful man, and perhaps a humble one also, as he learns
how many more struggles and doubts, discoveries, sorrows and joys,
the human race has passed through, than are contained in his own
private experience.

The true value of the book is, that though not exhaustive of the
subject, it is suggestive. It affords the best, indeed the only
general, sketch of the subject which we have in England, and gives
therein boundless food for future thought and reading; and the
country parson, or the thoughtful professional man, who has no time
to follow out the question for himself, much less to hunt out and
examine original documents, may learn from these pages a thousand
curious and interes