Nature Mysticism Part 17

Such is the leaven that is working in much of the foremost thinking of our time. The reign of materialism is pa.s.sing--that of mysticism waxing in imperative insistence and extent of sway. And the heart of the nature-mystic rejoices to know that his master-principle of kinship universal is coming to its own.

Anatole France and Maeterlinck are striving to seize on the harmonies between the physical, the vegetable, and the animal spheres--the air and sunshine, the flowers, and the bees; add the moral and spiritual harmonies, and Mysticism stands complete-- it strives to read the secret of existence as a whole, of the "_elan vital_" in this or any other world.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV

PRAGMATIC

The programme laid down in the introductory chapter has been fulfilled. There has been no attempt to make any single section, much less the study as a whole, a complete or exhaustive exposition of its subject matter. The purpose throughout has been to bring to light the fundamental principles of Nature Mysticism, to consider the validity of the main criticisms to which they are subjected, and to ill.u.s.trate some of their most typical applications. A formal summary of the conclusions reached would be tedious and unnecessary. But it may be well to show that even when brought to the tests imposed by the reigning Pragmatism, the nature-mystic can justify his existence and can proselytise with a good conscience.

"Back to the country"--a cry often heard, though generally with a significance almost wholly economic, or at any rate utilitarian.

It gives expression to the growing conviction that the life of great cities is too artificial and specialised to permit of a healthy all-round development of their populations. From the eugenic point of view, physique is lowered. From the economic point of view, large areas are deprived of their healthy independence by the disturbance of the balance of production as between town and country. Each of these considerations is evidently of sufficient seriousness to arouse widespread apprehension.

But there is the nature-mystic's view of the situation which, when really attained, is seen to be of no less importance, though it is too often left in comparative obscurity. It is easily approached from the purely aesthetic side. The city may develop a quick and precocious intelligence, but it is at the cost of eliminating a rich range of experiences which should be the heritage of all normal human beings. In the city, the mind tends to be immersed in a restricted and specialised round of duties and pleasures, and loses "natural" tone. While, on the one hand, there is over-stimulation of certain modes of sensation, others are largely or wholly atrophied. The finest susceptibilities decay. The eye and ear, the most delicate avenues of the soul, are deprived of their native stimulants. In short, city conditions unduly inhibit the natural development of many elements of the higher self.

The evils thus briefly touched upon are undoubtedly forcing themselves more and more into notice, and are evoking much philanthropic thought and activity. They are more especially bewailed by many who, themselves lovers of art and lovers of nature, keenly appreciate the loss sustained, and the danger incurred. Ruskin's teachings have affected the views and lives of thousands who have never read his books. Those who have penetrated most deeply into the play of aesthetic cause and effect, well know that the very existence of truly great and creative art is at stake. Science, literature, politics, and a thousand specialised distractions tend to "saturate our limited attention," and to absorb our energies, to the detriment of our feeling for nature and of our enjoyment of her beauties. And yet it is only by keeping in living touch with nature that fine art can renew its inspiration or scale the heights.

There is, of course, the counter peril of an unhealthy aestheticism, marked by an a.s.sumption of susceptibility which is insufferable. Feeling, ostensibly expended upon external beauty, can become an odious form of self-admiration; and priggishness is the least of the diseases that will ensue. For with the loss of spontaneity and freshness in the feeling there goes mortification of the feeling itself. Still, this danger is not general, and is therefore less noteworthy. It may safely be left to the healing remedies instinctively applied by common sense.

The nature-mystic, however, does not linger long on the merely aesthetic plane. He goes deeper down to the heart of things, and holds that to lose touch with nature is to lose touch with Reality as manifested in nature. It is sad, he declares, to miss the pure enjoyment of forms and colours, of sounds and scents; it is sadder to miss the experience of communing with the spirit embodied in these external phenomena. For it is not mere lack of education of the senses that must then be lamented (though that is lack enough!) but the stunting of the soul-life that ensues on divorce from nature, and from the great store of primal and fundamental ideas which are immanent therein. The loss may thus become, not simply sad, but tragic.

And the weightiness of these considerations is not diminished when we relate them to the special needs of the day. Our time is one of deep unrest--showing itself in religion and ethics, in literature and art, in politics and economics. Unrest manifests itself in what we have learnt to call "the social question." How shall civilisation regain and increase its healthy restfulness?

Unless a cure be found, there will be disaster ahead. Democracy has brought with it great hopes; it also stirs unwonted fears. The people at large must be lifted on to a higher plane of living; they must win for themselves wider horizons; they must kindle their imaginations, and allow play to their non-egoistic and n.o.bler emotions. How better secure these ends than by bringing "the ma.s.ses" into touch with the elemental forces and phenomena of nature? "Democracy" (says Walt Whitman) "most of all affiliates with the open air, is sunny and hardy and sane only with Nature--just as much as Art is. Something is required to temper both--to check them, restrain them from excess, morbidity. . . . I conceive of no flourishing and heroic elements of Democracy . . . without the Nature element forming a main part--to be its health-element and beauty-element--to really underlie the whole politics, sanity, religion, and art of the New World." Yes, converse with Nature--even the simplest form of converse--has a steadying effect, and brings that kind of quiet happiness which has for its companions good-will and delicate sympathy. To sever oneself from such converse is to induce selfishness, boorishness (veneered or un-veneered), and inhumanity. The influence of nature means development; the lack of that influence means revolution.

Hence Wordsworth's invitation has its social, as well as its individual bearings:

"Up! up! my Friend, and quit your books, Or surely you'll grow double!

One impulse from a vernal wood May teach you more of man, Of moral evil and of good, Than all the sages can.

Sweet is the lore which Nature brings; Our meddling intellect Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things We murder to dissect.

Enough of Science and of Art; Close up those barren leaves; Come forth and bring with you a heart That watches and receives."

So Emerson, of the man who can yield himself to nature's influences. "And this is the reward: that the ideal shall be real to thee, and the impressions of the actual world shall fall like summer rain, copious but not troublesome, to thy invulnerable essence." So, once again, Matthew Arnold in his striking sonnet, "Quiet Work":

"One lesson, Nature, let me learn of thee, One lesson which in every wind is blown, One lesson of two duties kept at one Though the loud world proclaim their enmity-- Of toil unsevered from tranquillity, Of labour that in lasting fruit outgrows Far noisier schemes, accomplished in repose, Too great for haste, too high for rivalry.

Yes, while on earth a thousand discords ring, Man's senseless uproar mingling with his toil, Still do thy quiet ministers move on, Their glorious tasks in silence perfecting: Still working, blaming still our vain turmoil, Labourers that shall not fail when man is gone."

It is in nature, then, and in her subtle but potent workings on the human soul that we shall find at least one antidote for the undue and portentous tension of our day. To say this is not to depreciate science, but to put it in its rightful setting. Nor is it to depreciate culture, but to bring it into due perspective, and to vitalise it. Nor is it to depreciate art, but to endow it with glow, with variety, with loyalty to truth.

According to Pope, the proper study of mankind is man. How shallow, how harmful such a dictum! Contrast Kant's deeper insight. "Two things fill me with awe--the starry heaven without, and the moral law within." That famous apophthegm leads us nearer to the saving truth. For it contemplates man, not in his isolation, but as placed in a marvellous physical environment: to understand one you must understand the other also. Add the thought expressed in the fundamental principle of Nature Mysticism--the thought that nature is spiritually akin to ourselves--and we see that the proper study of mankind is human nature as a part of a living whole.

But the nature-mystic is not content to "study." He desires to hold communion with the spirit and the life which he feels and knows to be manifested in external nature. For him there is no such thing as "brute" matter, nor even such a thing as "mere"

beauty. He hears deep calling unto deep--the life within to the life without--and he responds.