athered out of
Patrick's Sermon, and but slightly altered.

[16] _Op. cit._ p. 509.

[17] "A Short Discourse on Superstition," in _Select Discourses_, pp.
24-36.

[18] "Discourse on Legal Righteousness, etc.," _ibid._ pp. 273-338.

[19] Smith uses this phrase in precisely the same manner as Jacob
Boehme.

[20] _Select Discourses_, p. 316.

[21] _Ibid._ pp. 319-321, quoted freely.

[22] _Ibid._ p. 21, quoted freely.

[23] _Select Discourses_, pp. 13, 14, 57, 61, and 118.

[24] _Ibid._ p. 370.

[25] _Ibid._ pp. 375, 393, 395, 403, 407-408.

[26] _Ibid._ p. 311.

[27] _Select Discourses_, pp. 303, 305, and 315.

[29] _Ibid._ p. 364. For Smith's view of mimical Christians see pp.
359-364.

[29] _Ibid._ p. 144.

[30] _Select Discourses_, p. 452.

[31] _Ibid._ p. 456.

[32] _Ibid._ pp. 452 and 445.

[33] _Select Discourses_, p. 416.

[34] _Ibid._ pp. 97-98. Quoted freely.

[35] _Ibid._ pp. 419-420.

[36] _Select Discourses_, pp. 421-423.

[37] _Ibid._ pp. 332 and 336.

[38] _Ibid._ p. 398.

[39] _Ibid._ p. 325.

[40] _Ibid._ p. 2.

[41] _Select Discourses_, pp. 4, 7, and 8.

[42] _Ibid._ p. 278.

[43] _Ibid._ pp. 3 and 288.

[44] _Ibid._ p. 12.

[45] _Select Discourses_, p. 12.

[46] _Ibid._ p. 165.

[47] _Ibid._ p. 260.

[48] _Ibid._ pp. 461 and 458.

{320}

CHAPTER XVII

THOMAS TRAHERNE AND THE SPIRITUAL POETS OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

I

The powerful religious upheaval in England which reached its
culmination during the two middle decades of the seventeenth century,
profoundly stirred both the upper and lower intellectual strata of
society. It fused and organized men on the one hand, and carried them
beyond themselves; and on the other hand it broke up settled habits of
thought, swept away many customs and practices which had become almost
irresistible subconscious influences, and left those who were in any
way morally and intellectually defective at the mercy of chance
currents and eddies. As a result there appeared a strange medley of
tiny sects. These groups, seething with enthusiasm, scattered pretty
much over England, unorganized or loosely organized, generally gathered
about some influential psychopathic leader, were lumped together in the
public mind and named "Ranters."[1] They are by no means a negligible
phenomenon of the period. They reveal the back-wash of the spiritual
movement, which in the main went steadily onward. They exhibit, in
th