entury shed its Upas shade over the Church.

And here let us say boldly to Mr. Vaughan and to our readers: As
long as "the salvation of a man's own soul" is set forth in all
pulpits as the first and last end and aim of mortal existence; as
long as Christianity is dwelt on merely as influencing individuals
each apart--as "brands plucked, one here and another there, from the
general burning"--so long will Mysticism, in its highest form be the
refuge of the strongest spirits, and in its more base and diseased
forms the refuge of the weak and sentimental spirits. They will say,
each in his own way: "You confess that there can be a direct
relation, communion, inspiration, from God to my soul, as I sit alone
in my chamber. You do not think that there is such between God and
what you call the world; between Him and nations as wholes--families,
churches, schools of thought, as wholes; that He does not take a
special interest, or exercise a special influence, over the ways and
works of men--over science, commerce, civilisation, colonisation, all
which affects the earthly destinies of the race. All these you call
secular; to admit His influence over them for their own sake (though
of course He overrules them for the sake of His elect) savours of
Pantheism. Is it so? Then we will give up the world. We will cling
to the one fact which you confess to be certain about us--that we can
take refuge in God, each in the loneliness of his chamber, from all
the vain turmoil of a race which is hastening heedless into endless
misery. You may call us Mystics, or what you will. We will possess
our souls in patience, and turn away our eyes from vanity. We will
commune with our own hearts in solitude, and be still. We will not
even mingle in your religious world, the world which you have
invented for yourselves, after denying that God's human world is
sacred; for it seems to us as full of intrigue, ambition, party-
spirit, falsehood, bitterness, and ignorance, as the political world,
or the fashionable world, or the scientific world; and we will have
none of it. Leave us alone with God."

This has been the true reason of mystical isolation in every age and
country. So thought Macarius and the Christian fakeers of the
Thebaid. So thought the medieval monks and nuns. So thought the
German Quietists when they revolted from the fierce degradation of
decaying Lutheranism. So are hundreds thinking now; so may thousands
think ere long