The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human NatureJames, William
ReligionComparative
The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature
James, William
Conversion; Experience (Religion); Philosophy and religion; Psychology, Religious; Religion
“My highest faith in God and truest idea of him were then born in
me. I have stood upon the Mount of Vision since, and felt the
Eternal round about me. But never since has there come quite the
same stirring of the heart. Then, if ever, I believe, I stood face
to face with God, and was born anew of his spirit. There was, as I
recall it, no sudden change of thought or of belief, except that
my early crude conception had, as it were, burst into flower.
There was no destruction of the old, but a rapid, wonderful
unfolding. Since that time no discussion that I have heard of the
proofs of God’s existence has been able to shake my faith. Having
once felt the presence of God’s spirit, I have never lost it again
for long. My most assuring evidence of his existence is deeply
rooted in that hour of vision, in the memory of that supreme
experience, and in the conviction, gained from reading and
reflection, that something the same has come to all who have found
God. I am aware that it may justly be called mystical. I am not
enough acquainted with philosophy to defend it from that or any
other charge. I feel that in writing of it I have overlaid it with
words rather than put it clearly to your thought. But, such as it
is, I have described it as carefully as I now am able to do.”
Here is another document, even more definite in character, which, the
writer being a Swiss, I translate from the French original.(29)
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.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account