Oxford University Press London Edinburgb Glasgow Copenhagen New York Toronto Melbourne Cape Town Bombay Calcutta Madras Shanghai Humphrey Milford Publisher to the UNIVERSITY Oxford Book Of English Mystical Chosen by D. H. S. Nicholson and A. H. E. Lee Oxford At the Clarendon Press 1924 N the early days of English mysticism the first translation of Dionysius' Mystical Theology was I so readily welcomed that it is said, in a quaintly expressive phrase, to have 'run across England like deere'. Since that time the fortunes of mysticism in these islands have been various, but, despite all the chances of repute and disrepute which it has undergone, there has been a continual undercurrent of thought by which it has been not only tolerated but welcomed. There have been, of course, heights of enthusiasm as well as profound depths of apathy in regard to it, but even if the limitations of the greatest enthusiasm have always been evident, so also has been the continuing readiness of some portion of the religious consciousness of the people to respond to what has been most vital in it. It is, in fact, the hypothesis of mysticism that it is not utterly without its witness in any age, even though the voice of that witness be lost in the turmoil of surrounding things. And now it appears-it has in fact been appearing for some years-that the fortunes of mysticism are mending. |