CHRISTIAN MYSTICISM. 



77 



He was extremely grateful to Dean Inge for his paper, which was 

 full of suggestion and would repay much study and thought. 



Mr. Joseph Graham observed that allusion had been made to 

 the fact that Mystics existed in all religions — Buddhist, Moham- 

 medan, and so on ; and if that fact were accepted there was nothing 

 peculiar to Christianity in Mysticism. If Mysticism existed in all 

 religions, the fact seemed to be that it arose from something in the 

 human mind, something common to all ; and he ventured to explain 

 it on this ground, that owing to the condition into which mankind 

 had come from the Fall and by the existence of sin, the harmony 

 of man's nature, body, soul, and spirit, had been disturbed. 

 Secondly, there would be found all over the world men of strong 

 spirit reaching out by their spirits to the infinite ; and practically 

 that was Mysticism. He was very much struck by what Mr. 

 Maunder had said in calling attention to the Incarnation of Christ, 

 and he would carry his thought just a step further. St. Paul 

 prayed that our whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blame- 

 less unto the coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ, and St. John said : 

 " When we see Him, we shall be like Him." The question was : 

 What like ^ " In His person, and in Him only, up to the present 

 moment, has been restored harmony of body, soul, and spirit." 

 In Christ Jesus there was a Man with a body perfectly adapted to 

 the needs of the spirit ; and it was the purpose and aim of Christ- 

 ianity to bring man to that condition. However much the spirit 

 of a man might reach forward towards it, he was hampered in the 

 present circumstances both by his body and his soul. True Mysti- 

 cism, therefore, was a reaching out towards that which Christ had 

 attained, and which we were assured on the authority of Holy 

 Scripture He had attained on our behalf. 



Professor Langhorne Orchard, M.A., B.Sc, said he was in agree- 

 ment with what Mr. Maunder had said so well about matter. Certainly 

 matter was not an abstraction : it was a reality. It was not the 

 highest reality : the highest reality was spiritual. He could not 

 concur with the gentleman who said intellect was foreign to 

 Christian Mysticism. He thought himself that the supreme 

 intellect was found in God and Christ. With regard to the 

 definitions which were quoted on p. 60, it appeared to him that 

 Mr. Rufus Jones gave the best; but the essence of Christian 



