ogical features in
their career have helped to give them their religious authority and
influence."[60]

Well, in what way are we to discriminate between the visions of a
religious person, admittedly of an abnormal disposition, subject to fits
of melancholy, etc., and presenting "all sorts of peculiarities
ordinarily classed as pathological," and the hallucinations of an
admittedly pathologic subject? Why should the ordinary classification
break down at this point? Dr. Granger, dealing with this aspect of the
question, says: "The religious genius is not proved to be morbid by the
extent to which he diverges from the average type."[61] Quite so, genius
_must_ depart from the average type in order to be genius. But the
statement is quite beside the point at issue. It is not a mere
divergence from the average type that warrants one in assuming that much
passing for divine illumination owes its origin to pathological
conditions, but the fact that it is possible to affiliate certain cases
of religious exaltation with these conditions. Hallucinations are common
to all forms of ecstasy, and ecstasy is not confined to religion. Given
a one-sided mental activity, intense concentration on one or a few
analogous ideas, combined with a lowered nervous sensibility, and we
have all the conditions present favourable to hallucination.[62] These
hallucinations may occur in connection with any topic that engrosses the
subject's mind. In every other direction their true nature is recognised
and admitted. In connection with religious belief alone, it is held that
they bring the subject into touch with a supersensual world of reality.
What possible scientific warranty is there for any such distinction?

Let us take, as an example, one of James's own cases, which he admits is
'distinctly pathological,' but without allowing this admission to
disturb his general conclusion. The case is that of Suso, a famous
fourteenth-century mystic. As a young man he wore a hair shirt and an
iron chain next the skin. Later he had made a leathern garment studded
with one hundred and fifty nails, points inward. The garment was made
very tight, and he used it to sleep in. To prevent himself throwing it
off during sleep he procured a pair of leather gloves studded with
tacks, so that if he attempted to get rid of the dress the tacks would
penetrate his flesh. Next he had made a wooden cross, with thirty
protruding nails, to emulate the sufferings of Jesus. He pr