contained in the mind, but brought to remembrance by Christ]. And with His sweet rejoicing Pie showed His blessed Heart cloven in two [bodily or imaginative vision], and with His rejoicing He showed to my understanding, in part, the Blissful Godhead as far forth as He would at that time strengthen the poor soul for to understand [an enlightening of the reason to the partial apprehension of a spiritual mystery]. And with this our Good Lord said full blissfully: "Lo! how I love thee!" [words formed in the imagination or for the outer hearing], as if He had said: "My darling, behold, and see thy Lord," &c. [her own paraphrase and interpretation of the said words].

Rarely, however, are the different modes so entangled as here, and for the most part we have little difficulty in discerning the precise origin to which she wishes her utterances to be attributed—a fact that makes her book an unusually interesting study in the theory of inspiration.

Thus, in provisionally answering the problem proposed at the beginning of this article, as to how far Mother Juliana supplied from her own mind the canvas and the colours for this portrayal of Divine love, and as to how far therefore it may be regarded as a product of and a key to her inner self, we are inclined to say that, a comparison of her own style of thought and sentiment and expression as exhibited in her paraphrases and expositions of the things revealed to her, with the substance and setting of the said revelations, points to the conclusion that God spoke to her soul in its own language and habitual forms of thought; and that if the "content" of the revelation was partly new, yet it was harmonious with the previous "content" of her mind, being, as it were, a congruous development of the same—not violently thrust into the soul, but set down softly in the appointed place already hollowed for it and, so to say, clamouring for it as for its natural fulfilment. This, of course, is not a point for detailed and rigorous proof, but represents an impression that gathers strength the oftener we read and re-read Mother Juliana's "showings."

Jan. Mar. 1900.

Footnotes:

[Footnote 1: Prefatory Essay to Walter Hilton's Scale of Perfection.]

[Footnote 2: The Protestant editor of the Leicester edition (of 1845), not understanding that an appreciation of difficulties, far from being incompatible with faith, is a condition of the higher and more intelligent faith, would fain credit Mother Juliana with a secret disaffection towards the Church's authority. How far he is justif may be gathered from such passages as these: "In this way was I taught by the grace of God that I should steadfastly hold me fast in the faith, as I had before understood." "It was not my meaning to take proof of anything that belongeth to our faith, for I believed truly that Hell and Purgatory is for the same end that Holy Church teacheth." "And I was strengthened and learned generally to keep me in the faith in every point … that I might continue therein to my life's end." "God showed full great pleasaunce that He hath in all men and women, that mightily and wisely take the preaching and teaching of Holy Church; for it is His Holy Church; He is the ground; He is the substance; He is the teaching; He is the teacher," &c.]

[Footnote 3: Ancren Riwle.]

[Footnote 4: It is clear from many little touches and allusions that throughout the "showings" Mother Juliana considers herself to be gazing, not on a vision of Calvary, but on the illuminated crucifix hung before her by her attendants, in which crucifix these appearances of bleeding, suffering, movement, and speech take place. All else is shrouded in darkness. Yet she never loses the consciousness that she is in her bed and surrounded by others. Notice, for instance: "After this, I saw with bodily sight in the face of the crucifix that hung before me," &c. "The cross that stood before my face, methought it bled fast." "This [bleeding] was so plenteous, to my sight, that methought if it had been so in nature and substance" (i.e., in reality and not merely in appearance), "it should have made the bed all a-blood, and have passed over all about." "For this sight I laughed mightily, and made them to laugh that were about me." Evidently she is quite awake, is well conscious of her state and surroundings, and distinguishes appearance from reality, shadow from substance. There is no dream-like illusion in all this. Appearances presented to the outer senses are commonly spoken of as "hallucinations;" but it seems to me that this word were better reserved for those cases where appearance is mistaken for reality; and where consequently there is illusion and deception. Mother Juliana is aware that the crucifix is not really bleeding, as it seems to do, and she explicitly distinguishes such a vision from her later illusory dream-presentment of the Evil One. This dream while it lasted was, like all dreams, confounded with reality; whereas the other phenomena, even if made of "dream-stuff," were rated at their true value. Hence it seems to me that if such things have any outward independent reality, to see them is no more an hallucination than to see a rainbow. Even if they are projected from the beholder's brain, there is no hallucination if they are known for such; but only when they are confounded with reality, as it were, in a waking-dream. As we are here using the word, an experience is "real" which fits in with, and does not contradict the totality of our experiences; which does not falsify our calculation or betray our expectancy. If I look at a fly through a magnifying medium of whose presence I am unconscious, its size is apparent, or illusory, and not real; for being unaware of the unusual condition of my vision, I shall be thrown out in my calculations, and the harmony of my experiences will be upset by seeming contradictions. If, however, I am aware of the medium and its nature, then I am not deceived, and what I see is "reality," since it is as natural and real for the fly to look larger through the optician's lense, as to look smaller through the optic lense. I cannot call one aspect more "real" than the other, for both are equally right and true under the given conditions. For these reasons I should object to consider Mother Juliana's "bodily showings" as hallucinations, so far as the term seems to imply illusion.]

[Footnote 5: For those therefore who make an act of faith in the absolute universality and supremacy of the laws of physics and chemistry, and find in them the last reason of all things, these phenomena are interesting only as studies in the mechanics of illusion.]

[Footnote 6: It was largely by this method, supplemented no doubt by that of reasoned discussion, that St. Ignatius guided himself in determining points connected with the constitution of his Order, according to the journal he has left us of his "experiences," which is simply a record of "consolations" and "desolations."]

[Footnote 7: i.e., A kinćsthetic idea, as it is called, an idea of something to be done in the given conditions.]

[Footnote 8: P. 272 in Richardson's Edit., from which I usually quote as being the readiest available.]

[Footnote 9: On another occasion, by looking down to the right of His
Cross, He brought to her mind, "where our Lady stood in the time of His
Passion and said: 'Wilt Thou see her?'" leading her by gesture from the
seen to the not seen.]

XIV.

POET AND MYSTIC.

A biographer who has any other end in view, however secondary and incidental, than faithfully to reproduce in the mind of his readers his own apprehension of the personality of his subject, will be so far