The Mystical Element of Religion, as studied in Saint Catherine of Genoa and her friends, Volume 2 (of 2)Hügel, Friedrich, Freiherr von
Religion
The Mystical Element of Religion, as studied in Saint Catherine of Genoa and her friends, Volume 2 (of 2)
Hügel, Friedrich, Freiherr von
Catherine, of Genoa, Saint, 1447-1510
There is certainly much in Our Lord’s own attitude, as we have already
found, to demand such a view; and Clement of Alexandria, Origen and St.
Justin Martyr have emphasized it continually. And there is no necessary
Naturalism here--for the position is entirely compatible with the
profoundest belief in the great truth that it is Grace which everywhere
produces the various degrees of God-pleasing religion to be found
scattered throughout the world. Father Tyrrell has admirably said:
“God’s salutary workings in man’s heart have always been directed,
however remotely, to the life of Grace and Glory; of ‘the Order of mere
nature,’ and its exigencies, we have no experimental knowledge … In the
present order, Theism is but embryonic Christianity, and Christianity
is but developed Theism: ‘purely natural’ religion is what might have
been, but never was.”[319]
(3) Now this must suffice as a sketch of the relations between
(Historical) Religion and Mysticism, and will have shown why I cannot
but regret that so accomplished a scholar as Prof. Morice Jastrow
should class all and every Mysticism, whether Pure or Mixed, as
so far forth a religious malady; why I rejoice that so admirably
circumspect an investigator as Prof. C. P. Tiele should, (in the
form of a strenuous insistence upon the apprehension, indeed the
ontological action of, the Infinite, by and within the human spirit,
as the very soul and mainspring of Religion), so admirably reinforce
the fundamental importance of the Mystical apprehensions; why I most
warmly endorse Prof. Rauwenhoff’s presentment of Mysticism as, with
Intellectualism and Moralism, one of the three psychological forms
of religion, which are each legitimate and necessary, and which each
require the check of the other two, if they are not to degenerate each
into some corruption special to the exclusive development of that
particular form; and why I cordially applaud the unequalled analysis
and description by Prof. Eucken of the manner in which “Universal
Religion” is at work, as an often obscure yet (in the long run) most
powerful leaven, throughout all specifically human life,--Sciences,
Art, Philosophy, and Ethics, calling for, and alone satisfied with, the
answering force and articulation of “Characteristic Religion,” each
requiring and required by the other, each already containing the other
in embryo, and both ever operating together, in proportion as Man and
Religion attain to their fulness.[320]
3. _Hermann’s impossible simplification concerning philosophy._
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account