TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE: Volume II is available as Project Gutenberg ebook number 50206. THE MYSTICAL ELEMENT OF RELIGION _All rights reserved._ [Illustration: _Walker & Boutall, ph, sc_ _St. Catherine of Genoa. (Caterina Fiesca Adorna.)_] THE MYSTICAL ELEMENT OF RELIGION AS STUDIED IN SAINT CATHERINE OF GENOA AND HER FRIENDS BY BARON FRIEDRICH VON HÜGEL MEMBER OF THE CAMBRIDGE PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY VOLUME FIRST INTRODUCTION AND BIOGRAPHIES LONDON: J. M. DENT & CO. NEW YORK: E. P. DUTTON & CO. MCMVIII RICHARD CLAY & SONS, LIMITED, BREAD STREET HILL, E.C., AND BUNGAY, SUFFOLK. PREFACE The following work embodies well-nigh all that the writer has been able to learn and to test, in the matter of religion, during now some thirty years of adult life; and even the actual composition of the book has occupied a large part of his time, for seven years and more. * * * * * The precise object of the book naturally grew in range, depth and clearness, under the stress of the labour of its production. This object will perhaps be best explained by means of a short description of the undertaking’s origin and successive stages.